DETROIT – An early-morning house fire in Detroit left a home destroyed -- but a neighbor’s quick actions helped save two lives and is now being celebrated as a powerful reminder of community.
For Lucille Williams, the past couple of months have been filled with emotion. She returned to the home she once lived in, saying seeing the destruction is upsetting. The memory of the January fire remains vivid.
“Yep. That fire was intense in that dining room,” Williams said. “Oh, God, was it intense.”
The fire spread quickly, trapping the 75-year-old and her roommate inside. Next-door neighbor Jamie White was awake when he heard screams.
“I heard help. And my wife said ‘fire,’” White said. “So, she started calling 911 and I just threw a coat on and ran outside. And I seen Ms. Williams hanging out the window and made sure that I could get her out.”
White and Williams had been neighbors for nearly four years -- cordial, but not especially close. That changed in an instant.
“This is the window I pulled her out of, right here,” White said. “And this is the window I pulled him out of.”
After pulling Williams to safety, White went back to rescue her roommate, Greg, who was still trapped inside and trying to escape from a window at the back of the house.
“I said, ‘Greg, where are you at?’ He said the back of the house,” White recalled. “When I came here, he was trying to get out this window -- he didn’t have nothing on. Then I gave him my robe and I pulled him out the window.”
Both rescues happened before Detroit firefighters arrived.
Because of those actions, the Detroit Fire Department honored White on Thursday, presenting him with its Civilian Commendation Award.
“He is my hero. My guardian angel,” Williams said.
White -- a husband, father of three and owner of I AM Shoes, LLC -- says he doesn’t see himself as a hero, insisting he simply did what he felt was right.
“God pushed me out the door and told me to go get her,” he said. “So, that’s what I went and did.”
The experience has created a lasting bond between the neighbors. White says the lesson is simple: look out for one another.
“That’s what you are supposed to do for your neighbors,” he said. “You’re supposed to look out no matter what.”
Williams agrees.
“Love your neighbors. Appreciate your neighbors,” she said. “Each and every day thank God for your neighbors.”
Williams said White’s wife and family helped comfort her while firefighters worked the scene. As for returning to the home, she says repairs could take more than a year, and the idea of moving back is still too traumatic -- at least for now.