I covered my first fire in months tonight. It’s weird how I get a feeling and then a few seconds later my pager starts ringing and sure enough it’s a 1st-alarm fire page. The trailer was fully involved by the time the first truck arrived. By the time I got there it was all out and hotspots were being knocked down.
As I was walking back to my car someone was driving down the road and asked what had happened. I explained there was a fire and gave a general location of where it was. No one was home during the time of the fire. The guy, who wasn’t more than a few years away from my age, replied back that it sounded like his home. A look of concern came over his face, but not the outrage or desperation like I would expect. Before he told me this I had a feeling I had worked with him previously or maybe went to school with him, but I couldn’t quite figure out why he seemed familiar. I was hoping I was wrong and it wasn’t his home, but the hug he received from a resident walking his way from the scene makes me think otherwise. I can’t imagine losing everything in an instance like that. I feel awful if he recognized me but I didn’t him, especially after delivering news like that.