Uber driver thought he was safe when he escaped burning building on firefighter's ladder...then the unthinkable happened

Daily Mail​

22-05-2025

An Uber driver trying to escape a burning New York City building on a fireman's ladder fell to his death after it buckled underneath him.
Ashiq Hussain, 53, and another person were seen on bystander video climbing down an FDNY ladder from the top floor of a Brooklyn apartment on Monday when the ladder's upper portion gave way and sent Hussain plummeting to the ground.
Firefighters were shown quickly gathering around him as the father-of-four lied limp on the sidewalk.
Emergency crews immediately put Hussain on a stretcher and brought in a second ladder.
A medical examiner determined Hussain died from blunt-force trauma, the New York Daily News reported.
Relatives of Hussain, an Uber driver who is originally from Pakistan, blamed the fire department for his tragic death.
'They did really wrong. They took the head of the family,' Hussain's cousin, Mazhar Iqbal, told the Daily News.
'They ruined the family's life.'
Hussain and his roommate were seen climbing down an FDNY ladder from the upper floor of a Brooklyn apartment when the top portion gave out and sent Hussain plummeting to the ground
Hussain's wife and four children were set to move to the US to finally be with the 53-year-old, who had moved to the country three decades prior, the Daily News reported.
'He's worked hard for his family,' the owner of M9 Deli and Grill, located below Hussain's apartment, told the outlet.
'He actually came in recently and told us he was so happy his family was finally coming.
'He was a very nice, respectful person. He comes in here, he checks on us, [saying] "Hi, how are you guys?" He knows my father. We're basically family. It's tragic. Tragic.'
The FDNY said it was aware of the incident and was investigating the 'facts and circumstances surrounding the tragic death of a civilian immediately,' the Daily News reported.
The ladder is no longer being used as the fire department investigates.
Hussain lived in the apartment with two roommates. The other two made it out safely, and one called Hussain's family to let them know that the father was being rushed to the hospital.
The rideshare driver had called Iqbal only moments before to tell him: 'I'm standing by the window' as the fire caused smoke to fill the unit.
'He was trying to breathe from the outside because inside there was a lot of smoke,' his cousin told the Daily News.
'I told him: "Be careful, soon the firemen are going to come and you can hang up the phone." I told him: "Be careful when you're going out to the ladder," because he is older and he was overweight.'
Hussain had been the one to alert his roommates to the fire. He worked overnight shifts and had just returned home when the blaze erupted started around 7am Monday, the outlet reported.
'This is a guy who literally saved two lives just minutes before he lost his own,' an unidentified family friend told the Daily News. 'A true hero.'
His family and friends remembered him as kind and hardworking person.
'I don't think you'd find a single person who had anything bad to say about him. He was always up there, right up at the front of the line to help people,' another friend told the outlet.
Hussain worked hard to fund his four children's education, and was even looking for a new place to live that would fit his entire family once they arrived in New York.
The family is now working to get his body back to Pakistan to be buried, the outlet reported.