COCHRANE TIMES (Alberta) 18 January 06 Family struggles after Water Valley fire (Cory Pytlarz) {Excerpt}
A Water Valley woman and her 13-year-old son are looking to put their lives back together after a fire destroyed their home in the early hours of Jan. 7.
Kym McEwen, 40, awoke on a Saturday morning at 4 a.m. to the sound of a fire alarm, flames and the smell of smoke in her rented trailer.
“My boy got up and started screaming the house is on fire,” recalls McEwen, who has lived on the property for just over a year.
Maneuvering through the black smoke she then managed to locate a cordless phone and dial 9-1-1 from the driveway in her pajamas.
Despite a panic-induced mix-up that saw McEwen tell 9-1-1 her house was in Cremona, where they used to live, McEwen is thankful for the fire department’s quick response.
“Those people are just amazing,” she says. “Putting up with people that are hysterical.”
And while she is grateful for the emergency crews who did their best to minimize the fire’s damage, the reality is clear.
Her home is a write-off, and most of her and her son’s possessions were unsalvageable due to the fire and smoke damage.
Perhaps the most precious of the lost items were 19 reptiles that McEwen’s son, Cody Joe, kept as pets and for breeding in the rear of the trailer.
The teenager attempted to go to the animal’s rescue in the rear of the trailer after the blaze erupted, but was withheld by his mother.
“He tried to run back in there,” McEwen says. “I had to wrestle him down to get him out.”
Only four animals, including one boa , two spotted pythons and one tagoo reptile survived the fire and have been treated for burns of their own.
“That was the hardest thing for him,” Cody Joe’s mother says. “For him it was pretty tragic. His reptiles, his whole life lived around them.”
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Family struggles after Water Valley fire