Cat safe after blaze
Published: March 6, 2006
The flames took most of the roof, but left the TV antenna standing on top.
Half an evergreen was gone; the fire at 39 Goshen Road had seared the needles off that side of the tree. The heat melted the snow around the now-black back of the house.
The woman and her children who lived there stood nearby, leaning heads on shoulders, talking on cell phones.
Neighbors hugged them. And the firefighters made the most noise: Water sprayed against charred wood in a smoky, steamy open-to-the-sky house.
The fire started shortly before 1 p.m. yesterday in the white house up on a hill. The woman and her children were home at the time, but none was injured. The cause of the fire is under investigation.
When the firefighters arrived, the fire was burning up through the attic, said Stephen Smith, chief of the Washingtonville Fire Department. Getting it under control took 45 minutes at most. The overhaul - ripping out smoldering boards, spraying flare-ups, picking out hot spots - took hours.
Of all the things presumed lost, the cat was the most worrisome. It was in that room, the girl in the pink plaid pajama pants told firefighters, pointing to the second window on the second floor.
Maybe five minutes later, the two firefighters walked along the side of house.
The first to come around the corner and into view put two gloved thumbs up. The second carried a surprisingly calm-looking white, brown and black cat.
They found it under the sofa, maybe one life short of nine.
The girl said thank-you many times.
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