DETROIT — A tragic house fire on Detroit’s west side claimed the life of Wendy Doucette and left five others hospitalized, including a baby, according to the Detroit Fire Department.

The fire broke out just before 10 a.m. Tuesday in the 20000 block of San Juan Drive. Neighbors rushed in to help rescue occupants from the smoke-filled home. T.J. Davis, who helped save two children, recalled, “I grabbed one toddler out the side window and was able to kick the side door open so they could get out. Then I ran into the kitchen to get the other boy. It was full of thick black smoke.”

Five people were rescued from the home and hospitalized:

A 1-year-old baby, rescued through a window, who is expected to recover.
A 3-year-old and a 14-year-old, both in critical condition.
An adult man, who self-evacuated.
An adult woman, the mother of the baby, who is expected to make a full recovery.

Neighbors praised each other’s bravery. Angela Boone, another neighbor, said, “They gave me the baby. That’s when I saw the other boy and said, ‘we need crowbars!’” Another witness added, “The real hero is my neighbor…he saved the rest of the family.”

The cause of the fire is still under investigation. The Detroit Fire Department’s mental health unit was on-site to support first responders, marking this as the second fatal fire the department responded to Tuesday morning. Earlier, a man and a dog died in a fire in the 4000 block of Clippert, also on the city’s west side.