One afternoon daughter L came home with the news that there was some kind of accident down the street. We walked over to see what had happened. There were firetrucks and police cars blocking the road. It was a house fire. I started talking to this man standing in front of the house. He was the neighbour who called emergency when he saw smoke coming from the basement window next door. He said he was surprised how quickly it developed. In no time the window blew out. Emergency transferred him to the fire department who came on scene within 5 minutes. There was a young man in the basement who escaped and it didn't appear that anyone was hurt. It seems it was a kitchen fire in the basement. It was taking over 3 hours to put it out.
A policemen came over and asked the man for information for his records. He didn't think to pull him aside so I was able to get the neighbour's full name and birthdate along with the cop's name. I did look away politely. I remember thinking the man was born in the same year as me! They had told him not to re-enter his own house until it was cleared. Luckily it was a nice day weather wise.
I walked by the house a few days later and it was being boarded up, the contractor said the tenants kept trying to re-enter the house to salvage what they could but he said the floor was in danger of collapsing and he had to keep them out.
