OVER THE EDGE March 14, 2007

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A horrific view of the charred inside of the Morgan family’s home.

Tragic Fire Devastates Family

STEPHANIE MorGAN CONTRIBUTOR

When fire pours out of the roof of 2 home it looks worsé than it does on television. For one thing, the fire is quickly going through a home that has actually been lived in. There’s no faux staging here, nothing to stop it being anything but a stark tragedy.

Blackened ash and the smell of fire retardant are the fare of nightmares for most people — stor- ies. that are used prolifically in cautionary tales and television to keep children from playing with matches. When that story becomes

. areality it feels much different.

When the dryer in my parent’s home caught on fire in the evening of February 12.my parents weren’t home — they were in Ontario be- cause of a funeral. My roommate, James, was housesitting while they were gone, and he managed to get himself and the dog out be- fore the fire fully took over. He tried three times to go back in and get the cats, but finally had to give up because of the smoke.

By the time I got there, the fire department was just trying to keep the fire contained. They were try-

ing to make sure nothing else in the area started on fire, and that this fire didn’t cause any damage to other buildings in the area. In the end the only thing that burned down was that one trailer.

Objectively, the bonfire that had been my teenage home was beautiful — lit up against the clear sky, with the red and white flashing emergency lights of the fire department, it looked a little like an outdoor Christmas scene. However, even that eventually was tampered down when the fire department got complete control of the site.

The next morning the site was handed off to me, filled with gut- ted remains and broken ashes. There was, remarkably, a good amount that could be saved. Fam- ily treasures that might mean little to someone else meant wonders to my parents who were still in Ni- agara Falls. My mother’s rosery was found — something that had belonged to her grandmother. A wedding band was also found hidding in some debris, perfectly safe. Ironically, a candle also sur- vived the blaze completely intact without even lighting the wick.

In the end, though, the house

was devastated. Chemicals hung in the air, leaving those few of us attempting to recover what we could from the fire gagging, and there were small spots still smol- dering forcing us to be even more careful. The water couldn’t be turned off, so the hot water tank gushed sprays of water into the already unstable bathroom floor. To make matters worse, gawkers drove by to stare at the remains unapologetically.

What had taken only a few hours to destroy was going to take days to even begin to scav- enge. >

done in a tediously slow fashion because of the unstable condition | of the floors and lack of walls in most places. Soot covered many

surfaces, and things had been |

moved around. Melted plastics covered every surface resulting in many questions; morbid curi- osities finally left most of us with a sense of unease and confusion at the end of day one. Attempts continued as we found and saved more and more heirlooms that may or may not be usable due to extreme smoke damage. However, out of this ad-

Much of the work had be to be

STEPHANIE MorGan, CONTRIBUTER

versity we finally managed to see some hope. The community surged forward with donations, al- most overnight, with all the media coverage we'd received. One fam- ily donated almost an entire house worth of furniture, allowing my parents to move into an apartment and start over. A hall and DJ ser-

vices were offered free of charge by the Kinsmen for a benefit event on March 10. Finally, basic home essentials were offered by many

people in the community. The

home may not have been insured, but people made sure that things were covered. ~