A LATE MORNING BLAZE in 2nd Avenue, Thomas Gap, President Kennedy Drive, St Michael, destroyed two houses, extensively damaged a third, and left nine people homelesss. None of the houses was insured.
Karin Jordan, who was in the house where the fire was said to have started, said she was asleep when someone alerted her that it was ablaze.
"I take two tablets cause I had the flu, then I went and lay down; my son was already sleeping. Then I heard somebody shouting telling me the house on fire. I ask which house and they said mine. All I could do was grab my son and get out," she said.
Jordan said she shared the house with her two uncles, aunt and a cousin. "It was the family house, I get raise in this house," she said, forcing back tears.
Her uncle, Shawn Jordan, said nothing was saved. "The only thing I got is the clothes on my back now," he said.
Karin said she did not know where she and her family were going to spend the night as her mother's house was also damaged by the fire. The mother, Michelle Jordan, said she, too, was asleep when she was alerted to the fire.
The house directly adjacent the Jordans' was also destroyed in the fire. This house was owned by Terry Carrington, and the single occupant, Peter Wickham, was outside at the time the fire started.
"Me and Shawn was there on the block talking when we hear the house was on fire and Shawn went and see the smoke coming from the front," he said.
Wickham said he would have to find lodging with family.
Three tenders responded to the blaze with one divisional officer, three station officers and nine firemen under the command of Assistant Chief Fire Officer Anthony Blackman.
