Fire Chief Sees Other Side of Fire When Daughter Calls: “Come Quick!”
“Dad, come over quick. We’ve had a fire in our house and I think we’ve lost everything.” It was my daughter Chris calling, one Thursday evening around 9 o’clock. She was crying.
Automatically I asked, “Was anyone hurt?”
“No,” she said, “Will was home alone, hut he got out OK.”
“I’ll be right there,” I said as I hung up the phone.
Thus began an ordeal with which I had had absolutely no experience. I confidently thought that after more than 30 years in the fire service there was nothing new I could learn about a house fire. I was about to find out how wrong I was.
My wife and I got into the car. The trip to our daughter’s rural home took about a half hour, and as we traveled my mind was full of the many possibilities and probable consequences. I wished I had asked for more detail, but then assured myself that I’d find out all too quickly.
Different this time
As we drove down the narrow country road to our daughter’s home, I soon sighted the cluster of revolving red lights. I had seen this many thousands of times before, but this time it had a completely different impact. I guided the car into a narrow slot off the road, then worked my way past the many cars and apparatus parked in the driveway and on the lawn.
I shined my light across the roof line of the house and was pleased to see it still intact. Next I ran the light across the front of the house, only to see the familiar broken, blackened windows, screens and storm sash lying on the lawn, bits and pieces of burned furniture—the usual afterappearance of a fire.
Our daughter met us on the front lawn and I was quick to assure her that the little I had seen at the moment didn’t indicate a complete loss.
“But it’s all black and stinky inside,” she said.
I suggested that she and her mother and her two children go up the road to her father-in-law’s house and try from there to contact her husband, Richard, who was away on business at the time. Reluctantly she left.
A good stop
Walking through the front door brought me into the dining room. I noted the severe charring in one end of the room which carried across the hall to her living room. The familiar mushroom effect was there. I walked down the intersecting hall into the bedroom area. The first room, their eight-yearold daughter Heather’s room, showed a burnout to the top of the door. Immediately inside was the attic scuttle panel. This was also severely burned and showed signs of the fire getting through to the attic. But the fire had been stopped. I mentally commented on what a good job the fire department had done.
From the hallway, I turned and went down the cellar stairs. There I witnessed an almost complete burnout of their large basement family room. Looking around, I found the origin spot to be under the stairway. “Worst place of all,” I thought.
I then checked floor joists and main beams and found them to be only slightly charred. “Chris will be glad to know this,” I thought.
Having made this quick check, I went up the road to my son-in-law’s parents’ farmhouse. I assured Chris that what I had seen indicated to me that her home could be repaired easily.
With the first shock behind her, Chris described what had happened. Seems that she had to take Heather to a Girl Scout meeting in town, and 11-year-old Will had asked to stay home. At approximately 7:30 p.m. he had taken a shower, then returned to the living room to watch T.V. A short time later, the smoke alarm sounded and he got up to check. Upon opening the cellar door, he saw tiny licks of flame appearing between the joints of the barn-siding finish of the family room.
Will had been well trained by his parents. He shut the door, went into the kitchen, dialed the fire department number, gave the dispatcher his name, his father’s name, the name of the road he lived on and even gave the color of the house. He hung up, took a snowmobile suit from the back closet and went out the back kitchen door and slammed it shut. Will then went down the driveway to the large oak tree, the family meeting place.
Will’s lonely wait
As he waited —completely alone—in the total darkness, the silence was shattered by breaking glass in the front of the house. The fire had penetrated the first floor and had involved the dining room. The dirty orange glow appeared through the broken windows, and it scared him, even from his safe position. He started to cry.
Will heard the sirens. Then the red lights appeared and two fire engines came up the driveway. The men got off the trucks and began connecting their hose lines. After a few minutes, his mother and sister drove in. He ran to them. All three consoled each other amid tears.
The next car to appear also had flashing red lights, but it was a deputy sheriff. He stopped near Chris and the two kids, then immediately started to question them. He wanted to know the amount of insurance carried, the whereabouts of the father. When he learned that Will was home alone at the time, he began with thinly veiled questions, insinuating that the boy had something to do with starting the fire. At this point my daughter took the boy away, saying that she would have no more of this type of questioning.
Chris’s mother-in-law appeared and the young family went with her to a neighbor’s house, from which she had called me.
My wife and I stayed at the farmhouse until early morning, making plans on what to do next. Realizing that we couldn’t do much more at the time, we returned to the city. The kids went to bed at their grandparents’ house, then Chris and Richard, who had returned, took their car to their burned-out house, parked in the driveway and attempted to sleep. I’m sure some of the things they talked about during the night included the many days spent by them constructing the house with the help of their families, friends and neighbors, a short nine years before.
The next morning, when we returned, my optimism suffered a severe blow. What had looked relatively easy then took on a more ominous appearance in daylight. I tried my best to hide my feelings.
Around midmorning the insurance adjuster came around. He advised first that we take all the unharmed clothing and either wash or dry clean it. This job eventually stretched into approximately two weeks of nightly washing and drying at our house. Next, the adjuster requested a total inventory of everything in the house, including prices. This process involved several weeks, since certain objects, primarily keepsakes and irreplaceable family items had to be separated and eventually kept regardless of condition. Last came the furniture which proved to be the easiest of all the inventory items.
The days in the burned, odorous house resulted in many breakdowns in morale, and on one occasion even caused giving up the day’s work in total disgust.
Temporary housing installed
Sometime during the daily inventorying and bookkeeping, a 70-foot mobile home was installed on the front lawn. The young family moved in temporarily. The relief of being back to their property was very apparent, and from that point on the drudgery of item-by-item inventory seemed to lose its sharp sting and was finally completed.
This done, the insurance company sent a crew that completely removed all the fire-damaged materials from the house. It took several dump truck loads to haul it all away.
Next, the carpenters appeared and the ugly black scars of the burned joists, studs, rafters, wallboard and flooring quickly disappeared—to be replaced by new building material. Along with all this, we began to notice that the afterfire smell was also dissipating.
Truly, things were improving and we all began to anticipate the work completion date, which eventually occurred exactly six months after the fire.
As I look back over this intensive work period and compare it to the relatively short time it took to extinguish the fire, I realize the small percentage of total time the fire department is involved in this kind of incident.
Some observations
Continuing to appraise the whole nightmarish incident, I made an overall mental evaluation. Two things took immediate priority and should serve as reinforcement to all fire departments:
First, our national fire service’s approval and promotion of smoke detectors was again validated. In this fire there would undoubtedly have been much greater damage, plus the possibility of loss of life, had it not been for the smoke detector.
Second, our national fire service’s approval and promotion of the family escape plan was also again validated. In this instance, Will knew exactly what to do for his own safety and should be given full credit for minimizing the damage to his home. His parents should also be commended for having taught the boy so well.
I had further reflections: As a paid chief I must commend the very excellent job done by the rural department that handled the fire. Their work indicated a well-trained and highly efficient organization. I also noted that the insurance people on the job treated everyone very fairly, and consequently left a good feeling with all concerned.
Now that it’s over, I have little doubt that these disturbing memories will be with this young family for a long time. Hopefully, time will smooth over the shock, but in the future it will still be remembered as “our fire.”
