The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Two Aspen Grove residents could have easily perished Saturday morning after one of them left a pot of food unattended on an active stove, Flin Flon Fire Chief Jim Petrie said. The blaring smoke detector failed to awake the man and woman in the suite, but an occupant of an adjoining suite called the fire department to notify them of the alarm. "If it wasn't for the individual who phoned the fire department, and the fire department, the probability of these people being overcome by smoke inhalation and dying was extremely high," said Petrie. "The probability of a fire on that street was also extremely high." When firefighters arrived at the scene shortly before 7 a.m., they urgently knocked on the door to the suite, which was answered by the female occupant. See 'Smoke' P.# Con't from P.# "The suite was totally filled with blackish smoke," said Petrie. Firefighters entered the residence to remove the source of the smoke and noticed a man laying unconscious on the couch. They shook the man numerous times before he woke up, at which time he joined the female occupant outside to be examined by an ambulance crew for smoke inhalation. The occupants were released on scene. Harm to the suite was limited to smoke damage, but Petrie said flames could have easily spread to the rest of the wood-frame structure, which contains seven suites in all. "If it had have caught fire, it would have been extremely difficult to put out," said the fire chief, adding that the two adjacent suites housed children and seniors. Petrie encourages citizens to always monitor cooking food, saying Saturday's incident is a reminder of what can happen if they do not. "Leaving pots unattended on stoves can easily kill. It's not the fire that's going to kill you, it's the smoke," he said. "We as a fire department consider this type of action extremely hazardous."
