My friend's beautiful new house just burned to the ground! But all are okay, including the dog.

[pink-o]

My friend, her fiance and her 16 year old daughter were awakened at 3 am on Sunday morning by a neighbor banging on their door. The neighbor saw the house burning from his window (still not sure why he was awake at that hour) and ran over to alert her family. They grabbed their robes, ran out and jumped in the car--and by the time they got to the end of the driveway, the house was engulfed in flames! Nothing was saved, and the fire inspectors told them it could be weeks before they can sift through the debris to find the cause of the blaze.

When I heard about this, I felt such sorrow: this was an amazing house and they were so excited to buy it--they only moved in 8 months ago! Of course, that pales against the fact that no one was hurt: all things, including houses, can be replaced. But what freaked us all out was how quickly the house burned. They barely escaped, and a few minutes later might have yielded a very different result.

So one reason they got out so fast was because they kept the dog close to them at night. If they had crated her and kept her in a separate room, my friend would have gone after her and maybe not gotten out of the house in time. I know I would never leave my dog or cat in a burning building, never mind my own safety!

I've always let my animals sleep on the bed, and now I'm more determined than ever! So after hearing this frightening story, I came away with one thought: Keep your pets close at night, you never know when you need to grab them and run!

[valerief]

1. The dog didn't alert them to the fire? Strange. nt

[pink-o]

3. I'm not sure why that is either.

It was a pretty big house, and they were on the top floor. The fire started in the lower level, so maybe the dog hadn't woken up and smelled it yet.

The circumstances are still very odd. I hope the fire inspectors can come up with the cause very soon!

[The Straight Story]

12. my X sister in-law's house burnt down not long ago

They didn't hear the dogs. All three dogs died, but the family got out ok.

I hear my dogs bark all the time, if a spider farts at night they go off. Maybe they just got used to it.

[valerief]

15. Yeah, you're probably right. nt

[NNN0LHI]

13. Both my dogs start barking like crazy if someone just lights a cigarette in my house

They don't like it.

Don

[surrealAmerican]

18. We had a minor fire in my house when I was a teen.

It was enough to fill the house with smoke. We had to wake the dog up to get him out of there. Not all dogs react to smoke.

[LWolf]

30. My dog

barks gleefully at every opportunity. She sleeps at the foot of my bed (on the floor) and gets up to bark at every little noise, often charging the full length of the house to her doggy door, and then down the full length of the wooden sidewalk behind the house, which is noisy, to continue barking.

I ignore it, or I'd never get any sleep. I might not respond to a "fire" bark.

On the other hand, I did get out of bed at midnight a few weeks ago when I apparently noticed a different "tone" to the barking. It was frantic and intense, and there was a galloping sound that went with it. She was at the northwest corner of the yard, barking, and then she'd charge in a big circle up the stairs to the deck outside the bedroom, then leap off the deck to bark again, and repeat. It wasn't a "rabbit" bark, or a "deer" bark, or "I can see the neighbor's dog and I must defend our territory" bark. The moon was full; I stepped out of the deck, and something large dropped out of the tree on the other side of the fence and took off. All I saw was a shadow.

Larger than a housecat, smaller than a bobcat, and the ground was too frozen to leave tracks.

Maybe I'd wake up after all, if the "fire" bark was different than the regular barking.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. Thank goodness they're OK...

NEXT time, make sure there are fire sprinklers in the whole house.

Water damage is no joke, but it's easier to fix.

Yikes.

[pink-o]

7. I lived through a house fire in 1983

..it was a rental with a faulty gas heater, and also late at night. My boyfriend and I got out without harm as well (I had no pet at the time) but I didn't have access to a fire extinguisher. Since then, I've always made sure there's one in every house I live in, as well as a working smoke alarm.

I don't know what burned so quickly in this house, but it seems that once it started, it spread way too fast to contain!

[CaliforniaPeggy]

11. I'm not talking about fire extinguishers.

I'm talking about built-in whole house fire sprinklers. They are embedded in the ceilings, and the heat melts a connection that allows the sprinkler to fall out of the ceiling, and then the water sprays all over the place.

After I saw a TV show that demonstrated how well these sprinklers work, I insisted that we have them in our custom house.

Smoke alarms are also necessary.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

16. Fire sprinklers?

That'd be pretty damn expensive to install. Most people can't afford that sort of thing.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

17. They would be expensive to install into an existing house.

But not when the house is going up...

:shrug:

[bigwillq]

4. That's terrible.

I am glad everyone is ok.:hug:

BTW, I am often up at 3 a.m.

[tabbycat31]

5. I'm glad everyone was okay

[flvegan]

6. Smoke detectors didn't go off?

Glad everyone is okay.

[pink-o]

8. I think most homes just have a smoke detector in the kitchen.

They think this fire started on the lower level, and the kitchen was on the third floor.

[surrealAmerican]

19. Around here they are required in bedrooms too.

It depends on the state.

[pipi_k]

20. Yep, here too.

Kitchen, bedrooms, and cellar/basement.

Which is a little weird because it's a really small house, but that's the way it is.

[Ohio Joe]

9. Also take pictures now

I lost everything in a fire last Aug. I had insurance but it is a wicked pain to fill out the forms. You have to have a line item for everything you own. Own 500 books... 500 line items. Own a few hundred DVDs, a few hundred line items. Every last thing you own has to be its own line item, think about that for a minute and then try to remember everything you own. I would have given anything to have pictures and with cell phone cameras, there is no reason for people not to do it.

[mnhtnbb]

10. When our house burned down in August 2007, we got out with our dog

without robes or slippers. It was 4:30 in the morning. My son was awakened by the smoke alarm outside
his bedroom. I saw the fire (which we believe started on our back deck) out the window as I was coming
back from the bathroom.

We always put the cats out at night; each of them returned to the burned structure (total loss)the night after the fire and the next morning.

If our cats had been in the house, I'm sure they wouldn't have survived. They probably would have run
and hid and there wasn't time to chase them or look for them. The fire department was there within 5 minutes of the call and in the house within 5 minutes of their arrival. They had to back out of the house and go defensive due to the heat; it was an inferno.

Please tell your friend how sorry I am for her loss. We had a horrible time, fighting with the insurance company (USAA)and our lender. If she needs someone to talk to who's been there, PM me.

On edit: new houses in Chapel Hill are required to have all smoke alarms interconnected: if one goes off they all go off. In our little 1800 sq. ft house (20 years old that we bought/remodeled last year)
there are 5 smoke alarms: one in each bedroom, one in the hall between two bedrooms and one in
the family area outside the third bedroom.

[pink-o]

14. Thank you, Mnhtnbb! I'll pass it along to her.

At least she's not homeless: her friends have put the family up and her three older kids are all happily domiciled all over the west. Right now, she's telling us she's doing okay, but we think she'll come to us in a few weeks and we can give her all sorts of practical advice.

Fires are so incredibly scary, mostly because they get out of control before you can even think about the next step! I worked in hotels all over London in the 70s, and we were required to take fire safety courses. But when my own place caught on fire, I did everything wrong. When I finally figured out what to do, it was far too late.

[mnhtnbb]

28. She's probably in shock. I know I was. Couldn't eat for a long time.

We had neighbors who took us in for several days and then neighbors who were going out of town loaned
us their house for two weeks until we could find/cope with moving to a rental house. I was three weeks
post hip replacement surgery; hubby had to continue working; my son had just started his senior year in high school.

There are so many things to be done: get everybody clothes, replace documents, start making lists
of everything in the house, deal with the insurance company. About a month after the fire we discovered
the insurance company was going to try to get away with not paying us the full replacement cost
of the house (which meant the lender wasn't going to be paid off and would expect to be getting payments
although the house was gone). We had to hire a public adjuster to help negotiate with the insurance company. Eventually, they paid up, but part of what we recovered went as fees to the public adjuster, which meant we were out of pocket for the cost of demolishing the remains of the house. It was a nightmare. We also discovered we were seriously under insured for contents. Although the insurance company gave us no trouble with paying the full amount for contents, we wound up with a huge tax deduction for uninsured loss on contents. I would rather have had the money!

I can't tell you how many times I've wished that I'd grabbed more on the way out the door; I didn't even grab the cane I was still using, which meant I was holding a phone in one hand talking to 911 and a railing for support. At least I grabbed my purse, which I always kept at the front door. Hubby jumped out of bed and didn't even put on his glasses or grab his wallet--and he slept in his underwear--to run and try to use a garden hose on the fire. A neighbor gave him some workout pants and a fireman gave him an extra pair of shoes from the truck. We counted ourselves lucky to be alive. Not long after our fire there was a big fire at a beach house here in NC where several of the college kids who had been partying there died in their beds. Coroner determined that they never woke up, having been overcome by carbon monoxide and smoke from that fire which was also an inferno in minutes according to the kids who did escape.

[pink-o]

29. I remember it well myself!

Wow, you really went through it! Mine was a long time ago, and I was 28 years old, unmarried, no kids no pets. My roomate was out of the house the night it caught fire, and as I said before, my boyfriend and I got out safely. Like your family, the neighbors clothed us and called the fire department for us. I had no renter's insurance and no big ticket items--my friend and I did have first issues of Beatles and Rolling Stones albums (vinyl: in 1983 CDs were around but not yet replacing records) which hurt to lose more than anything else.

I also remember moving in with my parents for 6 months, after not living in their house since I was 18. I actually whined about how I had to answer to them again! IOW, a young, healthy person's perspective--I don't know how I'd handle things if it happened again at age 54 and family were with me!

My friend is most upset about losing her baby pix of her 4 kids, which also made me realize I gotta update my picasa and photobucket sooner rather than later!

[lonestarnot]

21. I am sorry for the home loss, but glad everyone got out!

:woohoo: for doglets!

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

22. One of the last fires I worked I pulled two dogs out.

We attempted to resuscitate both dogs, one lived, one didn't make it. The contents of homes now burn much hotter than they did 30 years ago. In optimum conditions fires can grow very quickly. Your instincts concerning your dogs are good. They often get scared in fires and hide, I found those two hiding underneath a bed in a back bedroom. Usually if you search the room furthest from the fire you can find them.

David

[Liberal_in_LA]

23. bless you for grabbing the dogs

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

24. I've got five myself I wouldn't leave them anymore than I would leave a person.

[mitchum]

25. Dave, forget any disagreements we have had; you are a good guy

I mean that

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

26. Already forgotten. It always stays on the field with me.

Thanks though.

David

[pink-o]

27. Seriously! I will never crate another dog or close the door to my cat.

My bed will be a menagerie every night, now that I have justification for letting the dogs and cats sleep with me!