A Bit of “Excitement” in my Day

I was running late to get out of the house and up to the lab today. I had planned to do some of my work at the coffee shop on the way, but yesterday my roommate borrowed some food which I’d planned to have for lunch before I left. So, rather than eat and then do my work at the café, I stayed home to cook, and work at home while eating. I finished lunch and came to a stopping point, so washed the dishes (and noticed that the water was much hotter than usual *shrug*), set them out to dry, and began to close up my computer in the living room, when I heard some strange popping or clicking sound. At first I thought nothing of it, but when I heard it a second time, somehow it alarmed me. I ran into the kitchen and looked at the stove. No. Nothing on there. Then I saw the smoke.

We live in a rather old apartment, and instead of turning on cold water by the right handle and hot by the left, we always use the left handle—the right one gives out only a trickle of water. There is a lever just above the facet that controls temperature. If it is turned vertically, the water comes out of the wall and straight down into the sink, cold. If it is turned horizontal, the water is directed to the side through a little machine and then out through a different faucet, heated. The machine has a knob so you can turn it off, or up to one of three levels. We usually just leave it on the top level because it takes a while to warm up, and the water doesn’t usually get all that warm, anyway.

The smoke was coming from that machine. I ran over and flipped the switch to the off position. Then ran some water through it, which came out first scalding hot, then cooler. I blew the smoke away a few times until it stopped coming, opened a window, and mentally wiped my brow that nothing worse had happened. Phew.

Well.

Then I went back to my computer, closed it up, went to my room to put together my bag for the day, grab a jacket and scarf, and head on out. As I reached for my keys by the door, I heard a faint sound that made me turn my head back to the kitchen.

The water heating machine was no longer smoking. But the foot high flames coming out of it were the sound I had heard (such a small crackling sound from such big flames). I was so proud of myself. I dropped my bag, threw off my jacket, and was down by the fire extinguisher in a second (you can see by the picture above, that I took when I first moved in and included in that blog entry back in December, that it was readily available). You know how fast our minds work in moments like that, and I congratulated myself that I knew where the extinguisher was, and had previously read the instructions on how to use it. I was prepared for this and felt the calm-in-emergency that I love about my family descend on me.

Then the fire distinguisher was broken, and my mind raced to find a back-up plan as the flames rose. I was pretty sure I was dealing with an electrical fire, so couldn't throw water on it...

I ran next door and pounded to ask my neighbor for her extinguisher. Her mom (who doesn’t speak any English) answered, and I tried to convey what was going on. At least after the forest fire in December, I was very familiar with the word for fire. When she didn't seem to understand my frantic gesturing to the broken fire-extinguisher in my hand, she got it when I said, "Aysh!", pointed, and ran back into my kitchen. I grabbed my phone and called the police (I knew the emergency numbers are 100, 101, and 102, but didn’t recall which was which), and when she came in, handed her the phone, thinking she could converse with them better than me. It turns out she told her daughter that she had no idea who I had called and thought it quite strange of me to be making a phone call when there was a fire.

She told me to choke the fire with a blanket, but between the size of the flames, and the position of it against a wall and partway under a shelf, I didn’t think it would work. But I knew this was no time to argue--especially with my limited Hebrew, and I had no better idea, so we tried that…which lit the blanket on fire. Throwing that on the ground I was able to stomp it out, only to turn back around to the original one which was almost reaching the ceiling by now. My neighbor’s mom (who my neighbor later told me is horrible in emergencies) started yelling, “Maim! Maim!” (“Water! Water!”), and at a loss for any other option, I grabbed a mixing bowl and threw it under the faucet, which was thankfully still functioning. I felt like it would take forever for it to fill even halfway, and looked over at my neighbor, only to realize the smoke was so thick I couldn’t even see the top half of her body any more. A few more minutes of this and we’d have to leave the apartment on our hands and knees.

With a short prayer, I took the half filled bowl, and leaned back as I threw it towards the base of the flames. I didn’t know what’s supposed to happen if one throws water on an electrical fire, but hoped it wouldn’t explode out at me. To my surprise and delight, about a third of the fire went out! Finally with a glimmer of hope, I thrust the bowl under the faucet again. Now realizing this was the answer, the slow flow of water was twice as agonizing, but a few more dumps and the fire was out. A few more just for good measure, and one or two on the floor to fully extinguish the blanket (and bowl that had caught fire there, too), and the rush was over.

We opened every window, and I started the call-making and cat-finding. I left a message for my roommate and called my lab to let them know I wouldn’t be in, found the cats, and stowed them away so we could open the door for a little more airing out, and set to work on the clean-up. A couple hours later my roommate arrived, and she was able to make the other necessary calls to the landlord, fire department (to make sure there was no smoldering going on inside the wall, etc.), and electrician. Thankfully by the time I threw the water on it, we’d already blown the fuse (so it was no longer electrical), so half our house was without electricity, and we didn’t dare turn it back on without some inspection.

Our neighbor let us use her shower and fed us dinner, and we all rehashed it into oblivion from every point of view (her mom had called her and told her side of it while I was cleaning). Everyone is safe. The house is insured. The smoke is almost clear. There will be still more clean-up, probably quite a bit of painting to be done, and we will be investing in smoke detectors (I hadn’t noticed their absence until about an hour after the fire!), and a new fire extinguisher. What a day.