Early Saturday morning, the Airdrie Fire Department responded to a fire on the front porch of a home in Silver Springs.

Deputy Chief Garth Rabel describes the scene of the fire.

"The morning of January 12th at approximately 1:58 a.m, quite early in the morning, there was a gentleman walking (...) his dog on an early morning walk and he noticed a fire burning on the front deck attached to a home in the area of Silver Springs NW."

Thanks to the fast work of the passing neighbor, the Fire Department was alerted quickly.

"When the gentleman saw that there was a fire on the deck, he let folks in the house know, which is a good thing to do. Then he contacted the 9-1-1 system and got our rigs responding. Then he went back to his home, got a fire extinguisher, and went back and put the majority of the fire out himself. Thanks to his quick actions, we averted something that could have been much worse."

Thankfully, in part to the neighbor, Rabel says there were no injuries and the three who lived within the home were safe.

"No injuries. They were warned of it quickly enough. It did stay on the outside of the home. When our fire crews arrived, they did open a part of the exterior of the home, above the deck area just to check for extensions. We used our thermal imaging cameras, but they found, thanks to the quick actions of both the homeowner and the neighbor coming by, that the fire did not have an opportunity to extend further."

Rabel describes what started the deck fire.

"Right now, the Fire Prevention Bureau has determined the cause of the fire to be improper disposal of smoking materials and unfortunately we're seeing more and more of these types of incidents occur," says Rabel. "We remind the public that all smoking materials must be disposed of properly. They should never be placed in containers of plant material or thrown from windows of moving automobiles."

Despite the quick actions of the neighbor and the homeowner, there was still some damage to the home.

"There's about $15,000 damage to the home, so now they have to bring someone in (to) estimate the damage and do some exterior reconstruction."

 

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