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HOT AS SHELL |
HE may not have escaped quickly, but his bid for freedom started a fast moving, massive blaze that wiped out a family's apartment, injuring a firefighter and three cops in the process.
Giovanni, a six-year-old African spurred Sulcata tortoise somehow managed to tip over his tank, sending it's heat lamp crashing to the floor, which in turn ignited a pile of art supplies, including paint thinner.
As the rambunctious reptile made his bid for freedom from his 18-year-old owner, Mohamed Salem's bedroom the flames rose New York fire marshals revealed.
Within minutes, flames tore through the third-floor Brooklyn apartment that Salem, an art student at the Borough of Manhattan Community College, shared with his family.