Red Deer County Councillor George Gehrke credits a smoke detector with saving two lives and limiting damage after a kitchen fire at a house on his farm west of Red Deer on Tuesday.
Gehrke was haying near his parents’ former home in the Shady Nook district at about 5 p.m. when one of the renters’ daughters ran up to him in a panic.
All she could do was point to the house, her mother said later.
Rylee Steinman, 16, and her sister Keely, 15, were together in the computer room of the house when the smoke detector sounded, said their mother, Sue Steinman. The rest of the family, including her husband, Bob, and their 11-year-old daughter, Brandy, were off the property at the time.
The two girls went into the kitchen to see what was going on and found a fire on the stove, Sue Steinman said on Wednesday.
They had not smelled any smoke.
They tried to put the fire out but it spread, said Steinman. The two girls ran outside, with Keely heading into the field to get Gehrke while Rylee phoned 911.
Thick, black smoke was pouring from the windows when Gehrke got to the house.
A former volunteer with the Red Deer County fire department, Gehrke attacked the fire with the two fire extinguishers he carries on his haying equipment and then sprayed it down with a hose.
The fire was out when crews from three Red Deer County fire stations arrived. Crews and equipment remained on the scene to watch for hot spots.
Gehrke is convinced that the girls would not have made it out alive had the smoke detector not done its job.
Steinman said she also was told that her daughters would likely have been overcome by smoke and unable to escape if they had not been warned in time. Providing the smoke didn’t knock them out first, they may have been able to jump out a window. But they could not have found their way through the smoke to the door, she said.
The family returned to the house on Wednesday to inspect the damage and pick up some clothes. Most of their goods survived the fire but suffered heavy damage from the thick smoke that filled the house, she said.
While Gehrke has insurance on the house, the family’s goods were not covered.
Because of the number and enormity of fires and floods that have occurred across the province this year, including the disaster in Slave Lake, it will likely be five months before an insurance adjuster can come to assess the damage, said Gehrke.
The Steinmans are staying with friends in Sylvan Lake.
Sue Steinman has one comment for anyone who doesn’t have smoke detectors: “You’re crazy.”
bkossowan@www.reddeeradvocate.com