CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- An unattended lit candle led to a fire that left an 9-year-old boy dead and six others injured Wednesday morning.

  • A early Wednesday morning house fire sent seven people to the hospital.
  • One of the children injured, an 8-year-old boy, has died. 
  • The others' injuries are serious and possibly life-threatening.

Five children and two adults were taken to the hospital with serious and possibly life threatening injuries. One of the children, an 9-year-old boy, was pronounced dead.

Neighbors say from the outside, it looked like the fire started in the living room and in just a matter of minutes the house was up in flames. It happened on Academy Street just before 1 a.m Wednesday.

It took more than 30 firefighters half an hour to put out the fire at the home.

 

 

Eight people lived inside the house. Six of them made it out of the home by themselves, and four others had to be rescued by firefighters. Three of those rescued were children.
 
Officials say the family did have a working smoke detector inside of the residence at the time of the fire and they are still looking to see if whether or not holiday decorations were involved.

 

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