The apartment next door to mine had its smoke detector going off and smoke was billowing out the windows. So, I went to check out the situation, and the door to the apartment was locked, and no one was home. I thought the situation over for a few moments and concluded that it was time to call 911, but my phone was dead. So, I went back into my apartment and told my roommate to call 911, which she did after checking out the situation for herself. Luckily, my neighbor had only left something cooking on the stove when she had left, so there wasn’t a major risk of the whole complex burning down, but all the same four fire engines showed up, and they had to hack open the door. My poor neighbor, a single mom who’s very stressed and very sick at the moment. Now there are rumors that the complex might sue her for negligence.
So my question is, was this a good time to call 911? Should I have instead tried to contact my neighbor first? Should I have tried the back door too and ascertained more what was going on? I’m just not sure my reaction was entirely appropriate.
It was reasonable for you to call 911. If it hadn’t been, when the firefighters arrived on the scene, they wouldn’t have broken into the apartment: they thought the threat of a fire spreading was a real one, and there was no one in the apartment to let them in.
Yeah, I agree, you did the right thing. Something left cooking on the stove can easily turn into an out-of-control grease fire. If my apartment had smoke billowing out the window and the smoke detector going off, I’d hope my neighbors would call 911 on my behalf!
Every big fire was once a little fire. Of course you did the right thing.
I suppose you might have called the manager first, but if the fire spread while you were waiting for the manager to show up, you’d be kicking yourself. And so would everyone else.
Don’t fret about 4 trucks showing up for a pot on a stove. It’s their job, and they’re probably just thankful that’s all it was.
911 centers are busy but as the saying goes “Better safe then sorry.” 911 and other emergency center do co-ordinate calls. They prioritize calls so that even if you call in error, the operaters should know enough how to handle it.
At the risk of repeating myself, those firefighters that showed up in four fire trucks are the experts. If it wasn’t a good time to call 911, one of them would have asked who rang, and then said, “You know, this wasn’t a good time to call us: our services really were wasted putting out that small fire.” But they didn’t, and so it was a good time to call on their services.
Definitely the right thing to do. It turned out to be not-so-bad a situation, but think of it as Schroedinger’s fire; until the door was opened, you had no concept of the severity of the situation. Worst-case scenario: the neighbor (or her kids!) was inside, unconscious, while the place burned down around her/them.
The whole ‘band name!’ thing has gotten a bit stale, but in the unlikely event that I ever write a book, I am definitely going to name it ‘Schroedinger’s Fire.’
And yes, pouring smoke + smoke detector + nobody answering the door = 911.
Yeah, they said something along the lines of, “It’s probably a pot left on the stove. It doesn’t seem too serious,” and then they broke open the door and stormed inside. No one chastised anyone for anything.
I guess I’m just concerned about my neighbor’s new situation, but a bad situation is still much better than a catastrophe.
There’s a ground floor patio with big patio doors in the back. I was thinking that maybe I should have snuck around the hedge. Although not at the time.
Oh, HELL yeah. This was NOT the time to think it over. You did good, RadicalPi.
BTW, I had something similar happen to me. The smoke alarm in my apartment went off & the windows were “fogged” from the inside. A neighbor called the fire department, but fortunately before they knocked down the door someone contacted the landlady who let them in. It turned out that the hot water hose to my washing machine had broken, releasing hot water (and steam) into the room, flooding the floor, and setting off the smoke alarm. I got new carpet out of it, :), had nothing (but the carpet) permanently damaged, but the landlady decided that the NEXT tenant couldn’t use the washer/dryer hookups.
That was practically the definition of a good time to call 911. It’s much better that you called than spent time trying to get in touch with your neighbor while the fire went on.