Thanks everyone for the comments. I feel *so* bad for that family, their kids are so young- this has to be so traumatic for them- loosing their dog and toys...wow. The house doesn't look bad at all honestly. There is absoultely no external fire damage (inside possibly, but no flames were seen). The windows are knocked out (they are now boarded up), the inside of the house is pitch black, and it smells like burining rubber. I think the house is repairable, only about 1/4 of the house has damage, the rest looks totally untouched.

About two hours after the fire my neighbor Stephanie and I went to the pet store and bought decals for windows. I kept 2, she kept 2, and the rest we gave to our other neighbors who have pets.

There were absolutely NO flames visable in/on the house, just smoke coming from the roof/gutter area. They smashed out the windows and smoke could be seen coming out of the windows. Once they did enter the house and hose the house they were done in about 15 minutes. There was not one flame to be seen anywhere on the house- it wasn't like 15 foot flames were billowing out of the windows making it nearly impossible to enter the house, like other houses I have seen on fire, then it would be very understandable how long it took them.

A couple of months ago a house at the other end of the block started on fire around 3 AM in the morning. A wheelchair bound elderly lady and her dog were killed in the fire, seeing how it was most likely the same squad who responded- I can totally see why the poor lady and her dog never made it out of the house.


Personally, I would run back into the house to get my animals, they mean so much to me, I could not stand on the sidewalk knowing that my pets are still inside..no way!