Fire in the night - February, 2002

In the wee hours of one February night in 2002, we awoke from a sound sleep to see glimmers of red light dancing on the windows and walls of our bedroom in Hanover County, Virginia. The phone was ringing and brought one of those sickening moments when you get a call in the early morning darkness and you wonder if something terrible had happened to someone you know.

As we jumped up to look out the window, it seemed as if every firetruck in the County had parked along the streets bordering our corner lot and firemen were everywhere pulling hoses up into the yard.

The firemen were rushing to put out a fire that had climbed up the steep bank from the side street as it turned the dry leaves and pine needles under our trees into a layer of ash. That winter had been unusually dry and the leaves under the trees were prime fuel for the flames as they quickly ran up the bank. The fire crept to about ten feet from the end of our home and stopped only when reaching the green winter grass between the trees and the house.

Fire investigators never settled on a definitive cause for the fire at three o'clock in the morning, but suggested it had been caused by one of the ever present careless smokers that drive around thumping cigarettes out of car windows. The investigation concluded with a statement that the fire was most likely caused when a cigarette had been tossed out and rolled down into the ditch, then smoldered until the dry leaves caught fire. Once the fire started it roared up the bank and into the grove of trees.

As we stood in the road next to the fire trucks along the front, we learned from our neighbor across the street that they just happened to see the flames during the night and called 911 to notify the fire department. We will be forever grateful to caring friends for making that call in a neighborhood where neighbors knew neighbors and watched out for each other. The end of the story could have been much different had the neighborhood been one of those where people don't know or care who lives next door.