Neighbor says man killed in house fire was powering up generator before blaze

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

William Burton “Bill” Philips Sr., who died early Friday after a house fire that spared his wife, was trying to start his generator shortly before the blaze broke out, said his longtime friend and next-door neighbor in Peters.

“The power had gone out here in our houses, and I guess he was trying to get his generator started,” Tom Groff, 78, said Friday morning. “My son-inlaw, who lives with me and my daughter, he called over there about 9:30, about an hour and a half before it started, asking if he could help him do anything, and he said, ‘No,’ ’cause he takes care of those things himself.”

Mr. Philips, 84, was a retired farmer and mill electrician who grew up on the spread where he died as part of a farming family that once owned much of the surrounding acreage on Bower Hill Road. Firefighters rescued his wife, Naomi, apparently from a first-floor bathroom.

“I don’t know what happened. I just don’t understand it,” said Mr. Groff, a retired middle-school teacher in Bethel Park. “He was a good neighbor. He’d do anything for anybody.”

Authorities were alerted to the fire about 10:50 p.m. Thursday. Mr. Philips was pronounced dead at the scene at 1:05 a.m. Friday. The cause of the blaze is under investigation.

Peters fire Chief Daniel Coyle said he had heard talk about the generator but could not say whether it played a role.

“He’d been known to keep ammunition and gasoline and a lot of combustibles and a lot of flammables in the house, that’s what we were told,” Chief Coyle said.

A maintenance worker from Comcast spotted the blaze and called 911, the chief said. The first floor was already filled with thick smoke when firefighters reached the scene.

“It had a pretty good head start” by the time the Comcast worker called, the chief said.

The worker told authorities that an elderly man was trying to douse the flames with a garden hose.

“They were breaking windows on the opposite side — of my side of the house — to let the smoke out. It was more smoke than fire, but there was fire. The firemen, they were there pretty quick, but he just didn’t make it out.” — Tom Groff, neighbor of fire victim William Philips Sr.

“He had called 911 back and said that somebody is trying to put the fire out and refuses to leave,” Chief Coyle said.

Firefighters from Peters, Bethel Park, the city of Washington, North Strabane and Finleyville battled the blaze in the ranch-style brick home. They quickly found Mrs. Philips. Within 90 seconds, they located the body of Mr. Philips in a covered breezeway between his house and the garage, the chief said. A family dog also died.

It was yet another tragedy for the Philips family. Mr. Groff said his friend’s son and namesake drowned in a kayaking accident on the Youghiogheny River. The Fayette County coroner’s office said the drowning occurred May 26, 2014, when his son was 61 years old. He also lived in Peters.

The senior Mr. Philips could cut a serious figure, Mr. Groff said.

“He was a very stern guy. He liked to do everything himself, because he could. He was smart around machinery, anything like that, electric. He was a very capable man in whatever he did.”

Described by Mr. Groff as short and muscular, Mr. Philips was fit, though age was starting to take its toll, causing him to stoop.

He had a John Deere tractor and used it to help his neighbors.

“He’d cut everybody’s grass, anybody that wanted it cut,” Mr. Groff said. “He loved to ride that tractor around.”

Mr. Groff said he used to take big-game hunting trips around the U.S. and Canada with Mr. Philips. They headed to Alaska and British Columbia, hunting moose, bear, elk and caribou. That ended about 10 years ago, Mr. Groff said, as his friend started to slow down and turn his time to caring for his wife.

As a result, the vistas of Alaska gave way to the enclosed space of his garage, where he puttered, Mr. Groff said.

It was there where he headed after storms rolled through the region early Thursday evening and knocked out power to the neighborhood.

Mr. Groff said his son-inlaw, Bob Hoag, a retired EMT and fire chief in Chesapeake, Va., called over to see if he could help.

Mr. Philips said there was no need, he was just getting ready to start the generator. “He said he just had a couple of switches to move.”

It was in that area of the garage — with an attic on top that was “stuffed with things” — that firefighters seemed to concentrate their efforts, Mr. Groff said.

“They had a hard time finding him because he wasn’t in the bedroom,” Mr. Groff said.

Mr. Groff said his son-inlaw ran over as soon as he heard a siren. When firefighters brought Mrs. Philips out, he added, his sonin-law gave her mouth-tomouth resuscitation.

“They were breaking windows on the opposite side — of my side of the house — to let the smoke out. It was more smoke than fire, but there was fire,” Mr. Groff said.

“The firemen, they were there pretty quick. But he just didn’t make it out.”