Dramatic video released by New York City police shows the moment officers responding to a domestic violence call at a Queens home early Thursday were knocked off their feet in an explosion.
In the video, an officer tries to use a key to enter the residence when the front of the building explodes in a fiery blast.
"The guy just lit the house on fire," an officer says as fellow officers begin to stand. "We have an explosion."
The officers then approach the obliterated apartment and help several people, including crying children, outside.
Seven officers sustained injuries from minor burns to lacerations and were treated at the hospital, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said in an update. They have since been released.
"They were hurt. They had just been thrown to the ground by an explosion. And in that moment, with no clear sense of what else they might be walking into, they made the decision to keep moving forward," Tisch said on X.
She called the officers' actions "heroic."
"Their focus stayed exactly where it needed to be: on the people inside, on getting those children out, and on making sure that situation didn’t claim innocent lives," she wrote.
The suspect was identified as a 50-year-old man. Assistant Police Chief Christopher McIntosh said at a news conference that the suspect was unaccounted for. Tisch said authorities are investigating whether he is still inside the building, buried under the rubble.
At around 2:42 a.m. Thursday, police received a 911 call about a domestic dispute with a knife, McIntosh said. A woman said that her relative was intoxicated and armed with a knife and that there was the smell of gas in the apartment.
McIntosh said security video at the home showed the suspect arriving at the basement apartment where his wife, daughter and two grandchildren live. In the video, he carries two garbage bags filled "with canisters containing an unknown substance," McIntosh said.
McIntosh said the suspect forced his way into the apartment. His daughter and two grandchildren managed to flee, while the suspect "began menacing and threatening the remaining victim with a knife." He said the remaining victim was also able to get out of the apartment safely.
Officers arrived shortly afterward and talked to the victim outside, who gave them a key so they could enter the residence. McIntosh said the officers rescued other people who lived in the three-family residence.
The fire department responded shortly before 3 a.m. and said the building was "heavily involved in fire."
The cause of the explosion is still being investigated.
The suspect had three expired protection orders against him filed by a relative who was in the apartment, McIntosh told reporters. The most recent one expired in 2024.
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani said Thursday he had been briefed on the "horrific situation."
"I’m grateful to our NYPD officers, FDNY firefighters, and EMS members who rushed to the scene, rescuing residents and worked under extremely difficult conditions to keep New Yorkers safe," Mamdani said on X.
