HG Openhouse Blog

Hi Everyone,
This has been a hard blog to write. I feel I must get this message to as many as I can and our blog is a way to do this.

One week ago I was woken by a call from my daughter in law. Through tears, she said, Mom I’m bringing the boys over, our house is on fire.

They had a fire in their fireplace that afternoon, it was out and the boys were in bed for the night. Her and my son were going to bed too. She smelled smoke and my son thought at first it was a backdraft from the fireplace. She felt it was getting stronger and he went downstairs to check it out. When he turned on the lights in the kitchen, he saw a haze on the ceiling. He ran outside and looked up at the attic and there was smoke pouring out of the gutters. Running back in and upstairs he open the attic hatch and heavy smoked poured out. He told his wife to grab the boys and get out the house was on fire.

From eleven to dawn the firemen tried to put out the fire. They watched and they could see it was still smouldering. They had to pull the fireplace chimney from the house. They found the fire between the chimney and and the wall of the house. They were lucky they didn’t go to sleep. They would have lost that whole side of the house. Rebuilding will take time. I thank God they are all save.

I’m writing this because of something the firemen told us. He said many fires start in the attic of homes. Your smoke detectors in the ceilings below will not pick up this smoke as it rises. He said everyone should have smoke detectors in their attics. It is not expensive and it doesn’t require wiring, it could save your life and the lives of your loved ones.

Stay well, I’ll write again.