An Island woman’s habit of staying up late may have allowed her family and numerous pets to flee a fire early Saturday morning unharmed.
“I’m quite a night owl … I was up on the laptop (computer),” said Lisa MacMillan.
It was about 2 a.m. when MacMillan, sitting in her living room, saw smoke rising outside the house in Irishtown.
She woke her husband, Gordon, who opened the outside door to the sight of flames lapping at the roof of the three-bedroom bungalow with attached garage. He yelled for the couple’s two daughters, ages 11 and 13, to get out of the house.
The family fled, clutching gerbil cages and with two pet dogs joining the exodus.
The family’s pair of cats was not seen leaving, but no one was going to take the risk of returning into the burning building to attempt a rescue.
Fortunately, the cats both turned up safe and sound later that day.
MacMillan says the family’s four horses housed in a barn were a safe distance from the fire that “didn’t bother them a bit.”
Even a solitary goldfish left behind in its bowl in the burning house lived to see another day.
“We were lucky,” MacMillan said of her family and all the pets surviving the blaze with not so much as a scratch.
The house, however, did not fare so well.
Kensington fire Chief Barry Folland says the fire was “fairly well along” when firefighters arrived at the scene. Twenty-two firefighters responded to the call spending two hours at the scene.
Folland says the fire got between the roof and ceiling. Smoke and water damage was extensive.
MacMillan says the firefighters responded extremely fast. She says her daughters huddled in the family car as firefighters sprayed water on the house.
“The girls were extremely, extremely upset,” she said.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation.
MacMillan says the house is insured but has been told the family can expect to wait at least a couple months before they can move back in.
The family is currently staying at MacMillan’s parents about eight kilometres away in Kensington.
She hopes to soon find a house to rent that is close to their home in Irishtown and one that allows pets.
The cats and dogs are sharing space in the barn along with the horses.