Family of four and two dogs escape ‘explosive’ fire

Posted 9/16/14

Jo Ann Morey couldn’t believe what she was seeing when she looked out her door. Flames were climbing up the side of the house.

“I smelled smoke and thought there was something,” she said …

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Family of four and two dogs escape ‘explosive’ fire

Posted

Jo Ann Morey couldn’t believe what she was seeing when she looked out her door. Flames were climbing up the side of the house.

“I smelled smoke and thought there was something,” she said yesterday afternoon from her neighbor’s yard. In just minutes, the fire shot up the side of the house at 42 Yucatan Drive, the Morey home since 1978.

According to a resident across the street and five houses away, “The fire just exploded.”

Morey didn’t wait to take action.

“I started screaming,” she said.

She yelled to her son, Thomas, who was visiting for the afternoon, to wake up her husband, Kenneth. And she yelled to her daughter, Christina, to get out of the house.

Kenneth remembered his son banging on the door.

“I knew something was wrong, just the way he was yelling,” said Kenneth, who is a truck driver and works nights. “Then the alarm went off.”

Kenneth grabbed his sneakers and some pants and raced down the stairs with his son.

“We inhaled the smoke just running down the stairs,” he said.

Once outside, Thomas started spraying a garden hose on the burning siding.

Meanwhile, William Wilson as acting lieutenant on Engine 3 was headed toward making a fire alarm check at a nearby business. One of the firefighters on the truck spotted black smoke rising, and Wilson didn’t wait to be dispatched to the scene. The engine was at the fire seconds after the department started receiving a flurry of 911 calls.

“You wouldn’t believe it,” said Jo Ann. “There were fire trucks up one side of the street and down the other.”

“Thank God for them; they’ve been terrific,” she said of the firefighters. “I’m so grateful to the Warwick Fire Department.”

With the fire out, firefighters looked to compile information, including the name of the insurance company.

“Ken will know, he’s so organized,” said Jo Ann.

She was right. Ken and Wilson entered the charred house and in moments he was holding the policy.

The fire started outside and was so intense that it broke a cellar window with the flames spreading upward.

“You don’t want to see the kitchen,” said Kenneth to his wife.

The cause of the blaze is being investigated.

Jo Ann, who is a teacher assistant at Randall Holden School, couldn’t say where they would be staying. That wasn’t of concern yesterday afternoon.

“Thankfully, everybody made it safety out,” she said.

That not only included the Morey family, but also two dogs.

Comments

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  • FASTFREDWARD4

    ok who the first to say something about over time with the fire dept. Was the camera there.You can,t put a price tag on public safety period.

    Tuesday, September 16, 2014 Report this

  • allent

    had an explosive fire once...haven't eaten there since.

    Thursday, September 18, 2014 Report this