Hero dad saves baby daughter from blaze
Daniel Thomas had one thing on his mind when he raced into his burning house: his 13-month-old daughter.
He raced through the black smoke on hands and knees until he got to Addilynn’s room, grabbed her, and climbed out a window.
The family lives in a converted shed in Gordonton, just north of Hamilton, and the fire broke out about 5pm on Friday. Daniel didn’t hesitate to act. ‘‘I didn’t care about anything else in the house, just one thing,’’ he said.
Had he tried to reach Addilynn moments later, fire investigator Kevin Holmes believes he wouldn’t have been able to.
‘‘He’s really a hero. If it wasn’t for him doing what he did, they might have lost that girl.’’
On Friday evening, Addilynn was sleeping while Daniel was hanging an air-conditioning unit.
He popped over to his parents’ home – on the same property – to tell wife Courtney he’d finished, then went back to a shed attached to their home.
Suddenly, he heard the smoke detectors, ran out and saw flames through the window.
‘‘So I just sprinted as fast as I could to the door. It was just black smoke down to knee-height.’’
Courtney had been in the other house with their almost4-year-old twin sons, Mason and Landen. By the time she raced around the outside to Addilynn’s room, her husband and daughter were safe.
The family had talked about fire escape plans, Daniel said, and he had also just done a fire extinguisher refresher course.
It had got the couple talking about contents insurance but they had not got past getting quotes.