Today in the wee hours of this morning as I was sleeping I heard my neighbor’s smoke alarm go off, I thought this is odd so I got dressed and peeked out into the hallway then I smelled smoke. I waited for a second then I decided to knock on the tenant’s door to see if she’s alright. She opened the door and she had a look of confusion and fear. My experience in security and emergency procedures kicked in and I asked if I could enter she said yes. I looked around and saw a pot on the stove, smoke was billowing from the pot and the burner was on full blast. I rushed over to the stove, turned off the burner and switched the exhaust fan to high I then got a towel and put the pot in the sink. The unit was full of smoke and it was hard to breathe and I yelled out I’m going to open the all the windows to get the smoke out and to hopefully shut the smoke alarm off. Once all the windows were open I started fanning the room with a magazine, soon after the alarm automatically turned off. She then asked if I would close the windows and blinds for fear people would see in as they walked by.
The tenant was grateful I was there to help during this horrific moment and I was glad there were no flames on the stove in which case this scenario would have turned out differently.
This is the third time I’ve shown leadership when the fire/smoke alarms go off in the building and everything turned out fine. Like I said in my first Native Housing blog dated last year I intend to show the staff how the tenants should be treated by "being there for them”. Later when I returned to my unit I typed up a note for the office just to let them know what happened.
Hmmm...will I get a "Thank You, Tony" from the KM staff for my heroic deed? I'll keep y'all posted.
A special thanks to all those who read my "Native Housing" blogs. Since I started shamelessly promoting this site and according to the stats it has reached over 700 hits from North America. Not bad eh! :)
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