A Nanuet man was killed in an early morning house fire.

Flames ripped through the two-story house at 27 Amarillo Drive in Nanuet around 6:20 a.m. Neighbors say they tried to wake 75-year-old Michael Mantell as the house burned.

"When I came out, my neighbor was screaming and trying to wake him up," says next-door neighbor Johnson Thomas.

Thomas described Mantell as someone often seen in the community, who was friendly but kept to himself.

The fire made things tough for crews from at least five different local fire departments.

"When they got here, the smoke and flames were too intense for them to gain entry to the home. At that point, Nanuet Fire Department responded and they were able to gain entrance and remove the deceased," says Norm Peters, of the Clarkstown Police Department.