Some of you have asked what happened. This morning I found a news report that I missed yesterday. Beh took pictures this morning as well. Yesterday, when I went out to see the damage, I was surprised to see the house still standing. However, I believe the house is totally gutted. The flames I saw seemed to engulf the entire building and were higher than the highest point of a two-story roof like mine and my tall trees for at least 15 minutes before the fire trucks came and put the fire down.

Our houses all have garages in the front where our natural gas fed water heaters are. A feature I liked when I bought the house. There is a 10 foot space between the house and garage with a wooden patio and partial roof connecting the garage to the house. The lots are narrow, leaving only 10 feet between houses with a very narrow side yard. The water heaters have a pilot light, so I always kept my gasoline for my lawnmower on the opposite side of the garage. Based on the explosions I heard, the owner may have kept gasoline in the garage for his cabs. I was glad when I got an electronic starter for my water heater when I replaced it after the old one was 25 years old. I believe some sort of gas leak or gasoline fumes and the water heater pilot light is probably the source of the fire. The family could not come out through the front of the house because the garage was already blistering hot. A severe problem I have being in a wheelchair and getting out of the house.

After the 10-year-old boy alerted the family… The father is a cab driver… A private operator, they left the house in the back, a very small, fenced in yard, and climbed the fence into my next-door neighbors' backyard where Beh saw the teenagers and thought there was a party. When they pounded on the large sliding glass door to be let in my next-door neighbors' house to escape, probably my neighbors, thinking they were being burglarized, called the police. I didn't see the family when we came out of the house, but Beh said that they were across the street. I hope they rebuild the house to match the old one.

Ron

http://abc13.com/family/10-year-old-helps-save-family-from-fire/324256/