The former 'NBC Nightly News' anchor and his wife awoke to a blaze in their Upper East Side building on early Wednesday and praised firefighters for their 'fantastic job' to put out the flame.

• Jan 2, 2020

AceShowbiz - Tom Brokaw began 2020 with one frightening story to tell. On the first day of the new year, the former anchor of "NBC Nightly News" woke up to a "raging" fire at his Upper East Side apartment building, but was "very, very fortunate" to be able to survive the blaze along with his wife, Meredith Auld.

Talking to the New York Post about the incident, the 79-year-old journalist praised the New York City Fire Department for putting out the fire. "We're safe, and we were very, very impressed with the work of the NY Fire Department," he said. "It was close to the south floor of our building and it was fully involved by the time they got here."

More than 100 firefighters were reportedly called to deal with the fire on the 14th floor of Brokaw's building on E. 79th St. near Madison Ave. The legendary news anchor recalled, "We were awakened by their presence, frankly. Our dogs began to bark and we realized, we looked down in our elevator area and the fire department was coming up."

Spilling more details of FDNY's work, Brokaw told New York Daily News, "They used our kitchen and our entryway as sort of a staging point. They did a fantastic job." He added, "We're directing them and trying to help them as we could, although they were very self-sufficient. They were very courteous."

The blaze was placed under control by FDNY at around 2.30 A.M., two hours after it broke out. A spokesman for the fire department revealed six people suffered non-life threatening injuries in the incident, five of them were firefighters.

As for the owners of the burned unit, the New York Post noted that they were away for holiday. While Brokaw stated that the blaze cost "great property loss for the family," he pointed out the positive as stating, "It could've been a lot worse." He added that his unit was left undamaged though it "got a little smoke." He added, "Really, it's a cautionary tale about living in the danger of fire."

The cause of the apartment fire was still being investigated.