A Brooklyn blaze that claimed the lives of a loving mom and her two daughters left grief-stricken loved ones struggling for answers Saturday.
Danielle Havens, 48, and her daughters — 11-year-old Journee Miles and 9-year-old Kelsee Miles — were found inside the third-floor apartment on Gates Avenue near Tompkins Avenue in Bedford-Stuyvesant, where fire broke out in the family’s kitchen just after 5 a.m. Friday, authorities said.
“I need some time. I’m going through a lot.” devastated dad Kwan Joseph Miles told The Post on Saturday.
“I can’t talk to you right now,” echoed Dawn Havens, Danielle’s sister.
The beloved mom and daughters never had a chance despite the heroic efforts of the FDNY, who said the deadly blaze was a tragic accident.
FDNY Fire Marshals determined the blaze was “accidental due to cooking carelessness. A smoke alarm was not present,” the department tweeted.
A next-door neighbor said Havens moved into the Bed-Stuy home with her daughters less than a year ago, but the family enjoyed many happy times.
Evidence of hopscotch games remained on the sidewalk.
Mom and daughters enjoyed posing for playful pictures.
Journee was a child model, and photos of her appeared in the baby book “Love is” edited by New York City former first lady Chirlane McCray, according to Havens on Facebook.
Younger modeling photos of Journee appeared in Essence magazine and a Mastercard ad in addition to the book McCray edited, which was distributed to 200,000 city families to promote reading around 2015.
The girls enjoyed ballet and preened for the camera, according to another snap.
“Everything [Havens] did, she did with her children. She was beautiful,” said grieving next-door neighbor Darlene Brown-Bezear.
FDNY Commissioner Laura Kavanagh told reporters at a Friday briefing that firefighters responded to the burning building within three minutes and encountered “heavy smoke and fire on arrival.”
The doomed mom and kids suffered burns and smoke inhalation and were not breathing when first responders arrived, Chief of EMS Michael Fields said.
They were intubated and administered hydroxocobalamin – a drug meant to reverse the effects of cyanide overdoses, Fields said.
Mother and daughters were transported to Woodhull Medical Center, where they were pronounced dead, officials said.
The blaze was placed under control around 5:45 a.m.
Only the family dog survived the fire, according to one neighbor.
In response to Friday fatal all-hands blaze, the FDNY Fire Safety Education Unit was on the block until early afternoon Saturday sharing safety information.
Mayor Eric Adams on Friday noted the intensity of a mother’s love for her children and expressed that the tragedy touched the entire city.
“Losing two children, just our hearts go out to the family, the neighbors, the block,” he said.
