54-year-old grandmother Rosemary Thomas had a lot to think about Wednesday night as she dozed off on the couch in her home at Meadow Park Apartments. She had a touch of a cold, with a sore throat, and had helped her daughter Adocha Hodges pack to move.
Adocha said she had received an eviction notice and had planned to move out of the complex starting at 6:15 or 6:30 a.m. this morning (May 28, 2009). All her belongings were packed and stacked next to the front door of her apartment, which is on the first floor, right underneath her mother's apartment on the second floor.
Adocha, too, had fallen asleep on the couch, with her children sleeping around her on the floor.
Adocha awoke to her son, who was talking loudly. She was surprised to see him when she opened her eyes.
"I didn't even know the house was on fire, or anything, and all I heard was my son saying, 'Mommy I can hardly breath!' and I saw him — and he was standing up!" Adocha said.
She believes a candle in her apartment started the fire. But she's confused because firefighters told her that her bedroom window had been open.
"I don't sleep in my bedroom, and I never leave my bedroom window open," she said.
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Adocha Hodges' apartment this morning has an erie appearance, and smoke hangs thickly in the air as if the fire is still in progress — but it's not.]
Thomas, meanwhile, had fallen asleep knowing she would be up early to help move boxes.
Thomas is a Rochester and Community Technical College student with a double major in retail merchandising and interior design. Hodges works at Extended Stay America.
"I do her child care, I do her babysitting," Thomas said.
Another of Thomas's children, 19-year-old Ikea Thomas, had been up late, talking on the telephone, when she saw smoke coming from Rosemary Thomas's bathroom.
"It's just crawling around on the floor like tornado whirlwinds," Rosemary said.
She raced to get out of the three-story apartment complex with her son, son-in-law, 17-year-old daughter, two grandsons and Ikea.
At about that same moment, downstairs, Hodges was facing pitch blackness. She grabbed the two children closest to her and ran to get them outside. But the remaining two kids were screaming, too.
"I ran out my door and I'm screaming, 'Somebody please help me! Please help me!'" Hodges recalled. But she realized nobody heard, and two of her children were still inside screaming.
"Help me! Help me! Help me! Please, Mommy, come get us!"
"I'm like, oh my God, I'm not going to be able to get my babies back outside of the apartment!" Hodges said. She was afraid to go back in the apartment because it was so filled with smoke. But she was also afraid to leave her children inside, so she went back inside. Her daughter grabbed her leg and said, "Mommy we're right here." She grabbed the remaining two kids and all five of them escaped together.
By that time, Rosemary Thomas — well known in the complex as "Mama Rosemary" or "Mama Rose" — had reached the first floor. All she could think about was getting her children and grandchildren, along with other residents, out of the building.
She called out for Adocha, telling her there was smoke in the building and to get the kids out.
"Then my daughter was crying and she's saying, 'Mom it's coming from my apartment!'" Rosemary said. Adocha yelled that she'd gotten all four kids out.
"I hear her calling me, and I was calling her," Rosemary said. "She's saying, "Mom, I got the kids" — and that she had found the two who had still been inside.
Once they all made it outside, Rosemary said, she felt she had to return to make sure other residents escaped.
She went door-to-door on the second floor, pounding and telling people there was smoke in the building.
"I felt led to go and knock on these other people's doors, because I didn't see nobody coming out," Rosemary said. The smoke was so thick, though, that she began to feel light-headed. So light-headed that she thought she might actually pass out.
So she headed outside. But even though she knows the building, she couldn't figure out how to open the door.
"The door goes out, but I was pulling the door toward me. I guess I panicked," Rosemary said.
Once outside, she still didn't give up.
"I was thinking how to get these people out, because there's a fire somewhere," she said. She went from window to window at the first floor, pounding to awaken the residents inside.
"I could see lights on in some of the people's apartments," Rosemary said. Then she saw a family at the window of a third-floor apartment and she knew the smoke would be too thick for them to escape through the hallway.
"I said, 'I hear the fire department coming now. Don't open up your door. Just stay there, there's too much smoke," Rosemary called.
Firefighters had that family place wet towels under the doorway to block the smoke and protect themselves "in place," rather than taking the family members one-by-one down the fire engine's ladder — a potentially risky operation itself. Once the smoke was cleared enough, the family was able to escape.
"Everybody was helping. Everybody felt the need to assist, because we had so many children out there." The grass was wet shortly after midnight and there was a light mist in the air. So it was cold, and most of the kids had little on for clothing.
Adocha's children were shirtless and shoeless — and chilled. Once she got outside, she said, "I just started crying. I was just in tears. I just started holding my kids and crying."
Rosemary said many people thought her pleas to get out were another false alarm, because kids often pull the fire alarm when there is no fire.
Rosemary said the daughter who awoke her was arrested at the fire scene for an unrelated driving warrant and she hadn't spoken with her yet this morning. So there are many stressors for her today. But she has kept it all in perspective.
"I'm just grateful to God. I've been praying to God," Rosemary said.
She sat in her apartment, where the hallway outside still reeks of smoke, describing her experience.
"I love people, and I would have been really hurt this morning if somebody would have perished," she said.
Then let go a squeal of exhilaration when she saw one of her cats.
"Jewel!" she said. "I thought my cats were dead."
A Red Cross spokeswoman said Adocha and her children will receive assistance.
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