Fire in the Neighborhood

Yesterday, I was planning to write a post about the Tony Awards, and how I watch them every year even though I haven’t seen a Broadway show since 1995, and how Bret Michaels hit his head, and the shininess of Neil Patrick Harris’ tux, etc. etc. etc.

But my day took a weird turn when Mr. Martini called me at work from home at 9:30 yesterday morning, saying, “Do you know what’s going on over here?”

“What?” I asked.

“One of the buildings down the street is on fire.”

We stayed on the phone for about a half an hour, while he stood on the porch and watched as four, then five, then six fire trucks entered our neighborhood, battling the blaze. He described seeing the flames fly up in the air, the intense heat, the amount of smoke, and how organized the fire fighters were, issuing orders and getting people to stay back, out of the way.

Since I wasn’t there, my imagination ran wild with thoughts of evacuation and the fire getting out of control and leaping to neighboring buildings, but Mr. Martini assured me that everything was fine and our building wasn’t in danger. I was relieved, but for the rest of the day until I got home, I checked the news to see the extent of the damage, to see if anyone was hurt, to see just how bad it really got.

Luckily (and really, I can’t stress that word enough), no one was hurt. One resident was treated for smoke inhalation, and two fire fighters were treated for heat exhaustion, but that was the extent of the injuries. By the time the fire was out, 8 of the 16 units in the building were completely destroyed. The other 8 units had such major fire damage that the residents couldn’t go back in. Sixteen families were displaced, most of them losing all of their belongings.

Here’s what really gets me. The cause of the fire, as reported on the news last night? Someone flicked a lit cigarette butt into some landscaped mulch right outside of the building. The mulch caught fire, which spread to the building.

The fire started right behind the scorched pine tree, and traveled up the building.

Sixteen families displaced, all of their belongings destroyed, because some idiot flicked their cigarette butt rather than find a damned ashtray.

Seriously, this makes me so angry. I feel the same way during dry seasons, when I see people toss their cigarette butts out of their car windows. How is it any different than throwing lit matches around? I do not get it.

Smokers, please, please, please be careful with your cigarette butts. Find an ashtray, tramp them out, do what you need to do to make sure that once they’re discarded, they can’t hurt anyone. Because this fire was just too close for comfort, and made for a weird, scary day.