We had to evacuate our building last night!

As a wise precaution over the fact that the building next door was going up in flames! That building is about 15 feet from ours and on my side (I am on the 3rd floor SE corner of our building - that's the top floor). The other building's NW corner, top floor was engulfed. And the wind was from the NE, so we thought our building was in jeopardy. It was an extra alarm fire - so crews from at least two stations responded. They had the area blocked off for two blocks in every direction.

I tell you that having to drop everything and pack up 4 cats and get them down stairs (no elevator) is NOT fun. I took Jeddie and Beau down first, because I could not catch Leanne or Ariel, and moved my car, which was right next to the section on fire with just about 6 feet and two floors separating it. I could feel the heat. Then I went back up to get the other two and realized I had left the carrier in the car! I ended up putting them in pillow cases. That was after catching them. They were both freaked out. Luckily it wasn't our building on fire or they would never have survived because it took too long to catch them.

The firefighters got on our roof and sprayed it with water, but that wasn't until they started to get the other building under control. They were up there (our roof) quite a while, so I think everything is ok. We had power out for a while, but all is back to normal for us, I think. We were outside for 3 hours (cats in the respective cars). I got back up here about 45 mins ago. Jeddie missed his shot time by two hours - and was 333!

I feel so sorry for all the residents of that building. The one tier is totally destroyed - the top floor by fire and the second floor by fire and water and the bottom floor by water. The roof is gone over that one unit. I don't know about the other part of the building. And they just did a complete replacement of the back porch/stairways on that tier and were replacing the ones on the other side. The fire seemed to start on the porch or in the kitchen connected to the porch. My neighbor in the unit that was closest to the fire said he has seen that owner barbeque on his porch (all wood, of course) and use lighter fluid. I hope it wasn't something that stupid that caused this. It was that guys unit that was destroyed. I doubt there is anything salvageable in there.

Firefighters told us no one was hurt, but the news online said one person was taken in serious condition on oxygen to the hospital. I know there are dogs and cats in that building. I hope they got them all out safely.

I thank God, and the firefighters, that it wasn't worse for us and that no one was killed. I hope the guy that was taken to the hospital will recover ok.

 

Re: We had to evacuate our building tonight!

OMG, how scary that must have been! I'm so glad to hear you, the kitties, and everyone in the two buildings got out. I'm praying for that man and all the animals.

Before I bought my house, I lived in a condo that I rented from my mother. It was a small building of only 14 units and there was a fire in the rental unit on the third floor. Some kids tried to heat up something in the oven in tin foil and it caught fire. They tried to put it out and failed so they called 911, reported a fire and left the building to wait. They didn't pull the fire alarm or knock on doors and warn any of the other residents. The first I knew anything was wrong was when the hook and ladder truck arrived and started to put the ladder up the side of the building. This was at 1 a.m. so most of us were asleep! I threw on clothes and ran upstairs to see what the $%^& was going on and find out if I needed to evacuate the cats. The firefighters said it was a minor kitchen fire and no, we didn't have to evacuate. But I waited in the stairwell until I knew the fire was out before breathing a sigh of relief.

It was incidents like that that soured me on community living. :roll:

 

Re: We had to evacuate our building tonight!

I had a similar experience in a rental apartment before I bought this condo. But the people who's kitchen had the fire woke everyone up (also 2 or 3am. Talk about scary. Being woken up at 3am by pounding on your door and someone yelling "FIRE!" gets the adrenaline going.

Yep, I am waiting until I can own/live in a single family home. However, last night I experienced the best of what neighbors can be. Interestingly, the person that alerted all of us, the man who's unit was closest to the fire, is a guy that can sleep through anything, but he says the crackling of the fire woke him. He leaves for work at 2am, so sleeps from about 5pm to 1am, normally. One time his sister lost her house keys and stopped by to get her spares from him at about 7pm. She was pounding on his door and calling his phone, then got me to bang on the wall between my bedroom and his and it took both of us about 15 mins to rouse him.

 

Wow, Sheila...that is scary! thank God you and the kitties are alright.