3 Miami-Dade firefighters hit by falling bathtub from a burning home, officials say

Three Miami-Dade firefighters were struck by a cast-iron bathtub that fell when the second floor of a burning home collapsed Monday, fire rescue said.

Other firefighters took them out of the house and they are OK, according to Miami-Dade Fire Rescue.

It happened at a home in the area of Northwest 83rd Street and Fifth Court shortly before 3 a.m.

Cast-iron bathtubs are heavy and depending on size, can weigh 350 to 500 pounds, according to Better Homes & Gardens.

It’s unclear where the bathtub hit the firefighters. Fire rescue said there were no reported injuries.

Fourteen units were needed to extinguish the flames and the structure is considered unsafe, fire rescue said.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

This story was originally published November 29, 2021 at 10:51 AM.

Michelle Marchante

Miami Herald

305-376-2708

Michelle Marchante covers the pulse of healthcare in South Florida and also the City of Coral Gables. Before that, she covered the COVID-19 pandemic, hurricanes, crime, education, entertainment and other topics in South Florida for the Herald as a breaking news reporter. She recently won first place in the health reporting category in the 2025 Sunshine State Awards for her coverage of Steward Health’s bankruptcy. An investigative series about the abrupt closure of a Miami heart transplant program led Michelle and her colleagues to be recognized as finalists in two 2024 Florida Sunshine State Award categories. She also won second place in the 73rd annual Green Eyeshade Awards for her consumer-focused healthcare stories and was part of the team of reporters who won a 2022 Pulitzer Prize for the Miami Herald’s breaking news coverage of the Surfside building collapse. Michelle graduated with honors from Florida International University and was a 2025 National Press Foundation Covering Workplace Mental Health fellow and a 2020-2021 Poynter-Koch Media & Journalism fellow.  Support my work with a digital subscription