WOMAN PRAISES FIREFIGHTERS WHO RESCUED HER
WOMAN RESCUED FROM FIRE BLOCK PRAISES THE HEROES WHO HELPED HER
SARAH Harwood, 38, said she never thought it would happen to her.
She never imagined getting ready for bed one night only to discover thick toxic smoke spreading through her building.
She never believed she would be at risk from a deadly fire.
So when it did happen – just two weeks ago on Thursday, January 31 – she was thankful for the people she calls London’s “unsung heroes”.
Because they not only saved her and every other person in her block of flats in Knowles Close, West Drayton, they also took the time to take care of Lola the parrot.
“It was about 11pm and I was in my pyjamas getting ready for bed,” Sarah explained.
She lives in a studio flat, so her toilet, hall and kitchen are separate from her bedroom.
While getting ready to go to sleep, she noticed the smell of burning.
“First of all I thought I could smell that a fuse had blown or something like that,” she said.
“I opened the door and the communal part of my flat was half full of brown smoke.
“You never think you’ll find a fire. “I was too frightened to think. I was too frightened to think.”
Sarah admits she was frightened straightaway and her first thought was to tell her neighbours, who have children.
She feared they would be in bed, unaware of the potential danger. Then she just wanted to get out. But when Sarah went to the fire door leading down the stairs, she found her escape route blocked.
She said: “I opened the fire door to the stairs and thick, black, hot smoke came in.
“It’s one thing being frightened when you find a fire but when you realise you’re trapped, that’s something even more terrifying.”
Sarah contacted the Gazette’s website My London because she wanted to praise all the emergency services workers who helped her get through what happened next. She has hailed them all as unsung heroes but perhaps the most unsung of all didn’t go anywhere near the fire that night.
And yet without her, Sarah feels as though she wouldn’t have had the composure to get out safely.
“I get it’s her job but she was just amazing,” Sarah said. “I was too frightened to think and she did it all for me.”
Who is Sarah talking about? Her 999 call handler, of course.
After discovering a wall of smoke blocking the exit, Sarah called for help. The advice and calming words she received over the phone were crucial.
Sarah added: “She was so calm and practical.
“I didn’t even have shoes on, she told me to get shoes, she told me to get towels to keep the smoke out.
“She just kept telling me people were coming and she had sent this many firefighters and so on.
“It kept me calm, I was so frightened. I needed her to think for me.
“I can’t tell you how good it felt when she said ‘you should be able to hear the sirens.’
“When they got there I knew I hadn’t been rescued yet but it was just such a relief.”
Part of Sarah still wonders what would have happened without her cool-as-a-cucumber phone companion.
She said: “Without her – without all the firefighters, police and ambulance crews – we potentially wouldn’t have got out of those flats and things could have been very different.”
The voice at the other end of the phone line went above and beyond by arranging for Sarah’s parrot, Lola to also be rescued.
Sarah had been worried that Lola would get left behind when firefighters finally reached her.
But she was assured that would not happen and the fire crews proved the call handler right.
“You worry about your pets, don’t you,” Sarah said. “She’s only a small parrot. She’s a cockatiel.
“I thought it must be a huge fire when I saw people from upstairs coming down on a ladder.
“I thought they might not have time for her.”
Sarah, who was stranded in her flat on the first floor by flames and smoke in the central stairway of her building, believes she was one of the last to be rescued.
That’s because, she was told, smoke had risen in endless suffocating streams to the higher floors of the four storey block.
So residents upstairs were given priority, taken out by ladder or rescued with protective safety hoods over their heads.
At one point, Sarah considered jumping.
She said: “I said to the lady on the phone, ‘I can jump, it’s not that high.’ “I really thought about it.” Eventually, though, the firefighters arrived.
She said: “I was lucky. By the time they got to me they had put the fire out and started ventilating, I just had to take a big breath.
“One fireman took me out and another took Lola.”
Sarah cannot praise those who helped her enough.
She asked: “How many people do you know who would go the wrong way into a burning building? “They really are unsung heroes.” She continued to receive help when she got outside. And she is now living temporarily at her sister’s, with Lola of course - who is apparently still a “bit traumatised” by their ordeal.
In total firefighters rescued nine people, the London Fire Brigade said.
The brigade also confirmed the strategy Sarah has described – residents being told to open a window, stay in their flats and follow simple safety tips until fire crews could get to them.
Hillingdon station watch manager Gary Saunders, who was at the scene, said: “The fire is believed to have started under the ground floor communal stairwell and generated a lot of thick black smoke in the lobby and corridors.
“Fire crews worked quickly to bring the fire under control and ventilate the building to clear the smoke.
“Firefighters wearing breathing apparatus then used fire escape hoods to rescue three of the first floor’s residents who required to be led to safety and receive treatment.”
Fire escape hoods provide members of the public with up to 15 minutes protection from four of the main fire gases (carbon monoxide, hydrogen cyanide, hydrogen chloride and acrolein) and can be worn by conscious or unconscious people, London Fire Brigade say.
If more than 15 minutes’ protection is required then another hood can be given to each wearer. They do not provide oxygen but temporarily filter toxic smoke to make breathing easier.
Sarah didn’t need to wear one, though - something she says she is thankful for, as it would have added to her panic.
Ten people were treated at the scene for smoke inhalation, of which two men, two women and a child were taken to hospital by London Ambulance Service crews.
Six fire engines and around 40 firefighters - from Hillingdon , Hayes , Heathrow, Southall , and Feltham fire stations – took from arriving at 11.07pm to 12.46am to get the flames under control.
Sarah has heard rumours locally that the fire which tore through the building’s central staircase might be arson.
A police spokesman said: “Police were called at approximately 11.20pm on Thursday, January 31 to reports of a fire in a communal area at flats on Knowles Close in Yiewsley. Officers, the London Fire Brigade and London Ambulance Service attended.
“The cause of the fire is currently under investigation. There have been no arrests.”