SAN JOSE — The fire tore through the family’s small apartment as they slept through the darkness before dawn.

Soon, the husband and wife and their two children would awaken to find their home overcome with smoke and flames — and neighbors would be roused by their desperate cries for help.

The surreal scene unfolded rapidly in a quiet, close-knit neighborhood early Saturday after the blaze gutted a second-story apartment in a fourplex on the outer edges of downtown, leaving the Vietnamese-American father fighting for his life — and his wife and children dead.

San Jose Fire Department crews were called at 4:57 a.m. to the apartment building on South Ninth Street near Reed Street, Capt. Joshua Padron said. The response was quickly upgraded to a second alarm, then a third, after firefighters got reports that people were trapped inside the burning building, Padron said.

Firefighters arrived to find the back of the apartment building engulfed in flames and smoke. There were nearly 100 firefighters on hand at that point, according to San Jose fire Capt. Mike Van Elgort.

But that “wasn’t enough,” he said. “We had a lot of risk, a lot of potential injuries.”

Firefighters dashed into the building and removed four people, three of whom were found in the same room, according to Van Elgort. Despite efforts to revive them, the couple’s two children — their 14-year-old daughter and her 21-year-old brother — died. The Mercury News is not naming the victims because the Santa Clara County coroner has not yet released their identities.

The young man was a student at San Jose State University studying mechanical engineering, relatives said. The girl was a sophomore at Gunderson High School.

The parents were rushed to a local hospital, where the 48-year-old mother later died. Her husband was listed in extremely critical condition Saturday night.

“I can’t believe it,” said the husband’s cousin, 47-year-old Frank Tran, of Orange County. “In one night, suddenly the whole family’s gone.”

Tran’s cousin came to the United States as a refugee in 1993, traveling with his father, a former South Vietnamese military officer who was thrown into a communist “re-education” camp after the fall of Saigon in 1975. The family fled the country partly because Tran’s cousin wasn’t permitted to receive an education in post-war Vietnam because of his father’s connections to the South Vietnamese military, Tran said.

The family was so proud to send a son to San Jose State, Tran said

“It’s a huge loss to us and to our Vietnamese community,” said Thuc Tran, another cousin. “This is a very sad story for us.”

Fire investigators have determined that the blaze began in the kitchen, but they’ve yet to determine a cause. Though smoke detectors were found in other parts of the building, it was unclear if the apartment had working smoke detectors, Van Elgort said.

“These are the fires that depend on working smoke detectors to get people out,” he said. “In this case we’re still investigating if those smoke detectors were operational. For whatever reason, these poor people were not woken in time to get out.”

The fire was contained to only one apartment, but the residents of all four apartments lost their homes. Other units suffered smoke and water damage, according to fire officials.

Federico Solis, who has lived next door to the burned apartment building for 12 years, said he found out about the fire when he heard one of the tenants, the sister of the critically injured husband, screaming for help. The sister lives in an apartment downstairs, Solis said.

“On this street, most of the time, the kids and high school kids go back and forth. Happy, drunk sometimes and very loud,” he said. “That’s why at some point everybody kind of ignored the noise happening —. because they thought it was drunk kids.

“We first saw the disaster and then the firemen bringing all the bodies down,” said Solis, 45. “We were in shock.”

Jomar Lacsina, who also lives next to the apartment building, said he awoke to screams about 5 a.m.

“Someone was yelling ‘Fire! Fire! Fire!’” he said. “So we got out and started looking around and saw that it was right next door to us.”

The blaze was already raging by the time he went outside, said Lacsina, 39, who knocked on doors with other neighbors to tell people to get out.

“It was a huge fire,” he added. “I can’t believe it went that quick. Really scary scene.”

Lacsina described the family, whom he has known for about 12 years, as very hardworking, kind people. The wife, he said, had several jobs.

“She was always cooking, always smiling,” Lacsina said.

The couple’s daughter was a delightful young girl who was always helping her mother, according to Lacsina.

“Thinking about them, it’s just very sad,” he said.

Solis and Lacsina said they were not aware of any issues or complaints about fire safety or lack of inspections at the property, which they said was well-maintained by the owner.

San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo said it was “a kick in the gut” to see a family destroyed.

To downtown City Councilman Raul Peralez, the tragedy was a gruesome reminder of the August fire that claimed the lives of two grade-school children and an adult at Golden Wheel Mobile Home Park.

Now, once again, city officials will be tasked with helping the surviving family members get back on their feet.

“My office is going to do our part now, much like we did with the last fire, to try to make sure this family is supported, the survivors are supported,” Peralez said.

Specific donation efforts for the victims of the South Ninth Street fire had not yet been finalized Saturday afternoon, but Peralez suggested residents who want to help donate to the San Jose Firefighters Burn Foundation, which supports burn survivors and their families.

More information about the group is available at sjfirefightersburnfoundation.org.

Staff writer Lisa P. White contributed to this report.