PORT DEPOSIT, Md. — The quiet of a Sunday evening at the Homestead Trailer Park in Port Deposit interrupted by a loud noise, which caught the attention of Roger Richards.
“I was sitting in my house, and I heard a ‘pop’! It sounded like a .22 went off,” said Richards, “I came out and thought someone had messed with one of the vehicles, and I saw them run out with their little baby.”
A family of four plus an overnight guest; their lives all placed in jeopardy after the homeowner discovered a fire in the storage room next to her bedroom.
Fire leaves a family displaced in Port Deposit; Good Samaritan helps with evacuation
“She had jumped out of the bed and fell down. Lost her phone. She was hysterical,” Richards told us. “She said that she heard her air conditioner make a weird noise like a ‘pop’ and then the circuit panel caught on fire and the fire just shot straight up the wall into the ceiling and… bad.”
The woman told us her 18-year-old son emptied a small fire extinguisher trying to put out the flames to no avail.
Tragically, what the fire did not destroy was damaged by the water used to douse the flames, making this a total loss, with the property value estimated at 50 thousand dollars.
Despite the loss of their home and belongings, things could have been much worse if not for the victims’ neighbors.
“I do know the family,” said Margaret Aldrich, “I went and got the little girl and brought her over, and then he went and helped get the rest of them out.”
That’s right.
Roger Richards saw flames through the windows and people struggling to get out the front door when he sprang into action.
“I ran up on the porch and was helping get them out the door and got them out of the way,” acknowledged Richards, “and then the firetrucks showed up.”
