My scariest pictures ever, a fire near my home!

This was shot 12/26/2010 at about 4-5:00 am. A van had caught fire right across from my home! No one ws in the van,or injured thankfully, but the threat of fire to my home was to damn close and fit for nightmares for weeks to come! I awoke to my pets barking, so I inspected everywhere as usual, as I looked out the back window for movement or noise, I SMELLED a burnt wire smoke1 I proceeded to run to the other window only to see black smoke emitting from a van across the fence basically a car length away, so i grabbed the phone ran to my family while calling 911, we grabbed our pets ran outside in the freezing cold only to be made aware by my very sad son that our cat was inside still! i ran to open the door so she could run out while we called her name. i ran inside to attempt to get her unfortunately, but she ran away ugh! as i ran toward my house i heard the pop,and saw the flames shoot upwards towards my house! we thought the worse total devastation! the smoke was black,the fire color was high and it appeared our house was being burned, just before the arrival of the local fire department! after we just had no choice to watch and earn, i decided to run to my backyard to find out the damage if any, well thank god the fire was contained and did not threaten our home minus the fact that the blast of sorts sent flames towards our roof! i was glad to know that despite my loud knocking and yelling of my elderly neighbors name, she was not home and most likely visiting family for the holiday's! N.B.,get neighbors number, I am certain I left out many details, but this was and will be a pretty darn scary photo for me for generations I hope! Thank you for reading my post! I wish everyone luck, and always remember to check,and change your fire detector batteries!

http://i1118.photobucket.com/albums/...t/_MG_6817.jpg
http://i1118.photobucket.com/albums/...t/_MG_6826.jpg

http://i1118.photobucket.com/albums/...t/_MG_6825.jpg
http://i1118.photobucket.com/albums/...t/_MG_6861.jpg

I see you were sure to rescue your camera[:D]

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Originally Posted by clemmb

I see you were sure to rescue your camera[img]/emoticons/emotion-2.gif[/img]
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I had actually ran in to what I assumed,save the cat,but she was afraid and ran to hide! as i called her and basically ran around looking for her,our home is 1800sq.ft,with a lot of hiding spaces! i couldnt get her,so the next thought was to document in case i needed proof for insurance reasons hence i grabbed the ol canon that is always bedside :) isn't yours? i actually bought a cheap yard sale nintendo wii bag some lady said she paid 50.00 for but now her children dont even use it,or the wii! so now i will store everything in it in case of 911! i am slowly thinking of my next move to protect my family,and our treasures! my wife had her family inherited gold around until now! off to the safe deposit it goes! the good ol .45 stays of course ;) but lets hope the charges are safe [:(] if fire does threaten us again! i am glad i use digital online storage now, but we have a ton of old[:D] 1994-2002 regular family photos to protect now! i am seriously thinking of taking them to the safety box! the rest of our stuff is the usual crap,huge plasma tvs,ps3,wii,various game older sytems,and the prized children toys :( all that will be covered in our policy,and obviously are of no importance other than the grow on you feeling they have! furniture is not much or heirloom so that would not pose a threat, but damn it is very scary being caught off guard! i have had my car broken into many times in the past,and that sucks,especially when we had a higher then the stolen stuff deductible,go figure [:|]! anyhow the family is alive the threat was real,and to close,but thank god we survived another day to prepare and move on with future sleepless nights[8o|]

the damn flames of the combustion,or back draft shot freaking bits of flames towards our home! we all thought our home was on fire based on the huge smoke piles everywhere! i still have no damn idea what happened as i still need to contact the fire chief,because this was a very unusual and suspicious fire in my honest opinion plus the fact that it threaten my family! i have heard many nights of arguing in that area at the 1-2am time,and that same van is owned by the very people doing so! sadly they have children as well,but thankfully i havent heard or read anything serious! my wife is a 16 year postal employee and she has many friend that share stories,so we would of heard something prior to news coverage if any! i will definitely invest in larger aperture fire extinguishers now!