‘A TOTAL LOSS’
A house on Bundy Lane in West Hurley goes up in flames early Thursday, having started on the porch before spreading to the inside of the structure. A man and woman who were asleep inside when the fire broke out were alerted by a dog and escaped without injury, but the house was ‘a total loss,’ the West Hurley fire chief says.
A dog alerted two sleeping people to a fire on their porch early Thursday, and they were able to escape from the house without injury, according to the West Hurley fire chief.
The fire ultimately spread to the interior of the Bundy Lane house and destroyed it, Chief David Gutierrez said.
Gutierrez said the fire broke out about 2 a.m. when an electrical malfunction in a new refrigerator on the porch caused the appliance to overheat.
The chief said the man and woman who were in the house when the fire started “attempted to put it out with snow shovels, and then the fire broke a window out and it spread to the inside .... ”
“Upon our arrival, it was fully involved and the house was a total loss,” Gutierrez said, adding that the interior of the structure was “pretty much stacked from floor to ceiling with contents.”
The chief did not provide the residents’ names.
He said the dog, which also was not injured, might have saved the residents’ lives.
“If the dog had not altered them, they might have had a different outcome,” Gutierrez said.
The chief said a total of about 75 firefighters from four companies responded to the blaze and that it was under control within 35 minutes. He said it then took another three hours to remove the smoldering contents of the home.
The two occupants were aided by the American Red Cross after the fire, the relief agency said.