Fire, fire! The yard is on FIRE!

Well, today was one for the books.

I was studying for my Social Work board exam in the bedroom, with 2 fans blowing on me from different directions to help avoid heat stroke and completely engrossed in the land of the learning... or at least trying to be.

Then Nick Skype messages me saying that they can see smoke in the LAE area from campus. Interesting. I went out of the bedroom, didn't smell anything. Glanced outside. Still nothing. And wrote it off as not being a big deal. So I sat down at the table to tell Nick I don't see any signs of smoke when our entire house becomes engulfed in smoke. And when I say engulfed... I literally mean 100% filled with smoke... I couldn't even see my feet. My first reaction was "Oh my God, it is OUR house that is on fire!!!" 

I coughed my way outside and breathed a breath of fresh air 1) for my lungs and 2) because it wasn't our house going up in flames, but rather I could see it was coming from a couple houses down. Curiosity got the best of me, so I walked down closer to the water to try and get a look. At this point I was thinking it was contained, but still... I was interested. That's when I see fire quickly moving across the dried brush of our neighbors backyard quickly approaching our own backyard. After staring in awe for several seconds, I realized I should probably do more than just stare at it and ran and got our neighbors. Dana and I proceeded to run up and down the street and called security to connect us to the fire department and Dan joined some other neighbors in throwing buckets of water on an ever spreading fire.


Since we don't have the fire department number on hand (or didn't before, but now do) we called campus security to get the number. Dana and I each talked to them once, and I thought my conversation with them was pretty comical and  pretty typical "no panic, no rush, you can't really have an emergency" Grenada, so here it is:

me: "hi, we would like to report a fire, could please connect me to the fire department or give me their number"

security: "okay, we will file a complaint"

me: "no sir, a fire, there is a fire, we need the fire department, is it possible for you to give me their number?"

security: "yes, yes we are filing a complaint"

me: "This is like a real fire, and it is quickly spreading through ours and our neighbors backyards, we need the fire department"

security: "We will send one of our officers to come and check out the situation"

me: "this is not a situation where we need security, we need the fire department. I called you because I do not know the fire department phone number, please just give me their number"

Finally, I was connected to the fire department, who acted like it was new news to them that there was a fire (even though I do believe others called it in as well). The fire department did respond relatively quickly though, which was good!

Anyways, long story short, we watched the fire spread (and inch closer) to our backyard for about 40 minutes- hour before it was finally put out.  During that time the fire truck ran out of water which required them to leave with the truck and re-fill before they could return and put it out. While they were gone, there was a Grenadian man with his 2 buckets who walked up and down the rocks throwing water on the fire and actually kept it contained relatively well... and I stood nearby and had my bucket ready to assist if necessary too of course :)

The reason it started was not because of the dry ground and overly hot sun, but actually someone was initially attempting to burn things on their own. Hot day. Lack of rain. Very dry ground. Bad decision. It could have been SO much worse, and it was not easy to get the fire out. A few more feet and it would have been heading toward our houses via a wooden fence- really fast. And I would have been running to gather a few of our belongings before hitting the hills! Counting our blessings <3 

Our house after I went running out as it filled with smoke... there were few clouds in the sky today, so yeah... the white around it... not clouds.

The first time I ran down it was burning off in the distance a little bit, but the smoke was already way intense and I could tell it was moving pretty quickly

A few minutes later when I ran back down I saw just how quickly...

At this point we were anxiously waiting for the firemen to return as the fire came within a couple feet of the wooden fence that would have been really rather disastrous if it caught on fire and made the problem SO much worse... they arrived in time and other than smokey houses, none of us had any actual property damage.

Definitely was not an ordinary day and being from Michigan- I have never experienced a fast spreading brush fire before... thankful that my first experience ended with no major damage done and simply a good story to tell! 

Oh, and so my streak of being the crazy, white girl running up and down the street gathering the troops for some crazy event continues... reality tv ain't got nothing on our life here in Grenada :)