BRICK – Dawn Wakula and her family ran for their lives in the early morning hours of June 19 when they woke to a smoke-filled home and a fire raging in the garage of their Lake Riviera ranch.
The family includes Wakula, 54, and her partner, Dennis Heilbroun, 54, Wakula’s 30-year-old daughter, Brianna Hoffman, 30, her fiance Kevin Maher, 42, and three children under 12.
At 1:30 a.m. Heilbroun was half asleep when he thought he heard the smoke detectors going off. He knew it was serious when their backyard neighbor, Bill Bakos – who had woken up to use the restroom – called to say he saw an orange glow coming from their house.
“He said, ‘Dude, your house is on fire – get out,’” Heilbroun recalled.
Heilbroun ran across the hallway to the two other bedrooms to wake the family. The house was filled with thick, black smoke when everyone made a run for the front door, except for Wakula and Heilbroun, who ran out back door sliders which were closer to their room.
Heilbroun said that Brick Police responded “within seconds,” and officers in over a dozen cars – fearing a gas line explosion – evacuated about 10 surrounding homes.
He said it took 25 minutes for the fire trucks to arrive, by which time “the house was gone.”
According to Brick Bureau Fire Safety Chief Kevin Batzel, the perception is that it takes a long time for fire trucks to arrive when you’re waiting for them, but that’s not always the case.
The first fire chief arrived on scene in his vehicle within ten minutes of the 911 call. The police were there in four minutes, he said, who reported “heavy fire conditions,” upon their arrival.
“Thank goodness that they had working smoke alarms,” Batzel said. “By the time the alarms went off, the fire had taken hold extensively throughout the garage before the fire department even got notified.”
The fire was reported at 1:32 a.m. and fire trucks were spraying water on the fire at 1:46 a.m. Batzel said.
The fire traveled from the garage, across the attic, and then dropped down into the house, the fire safety chief said.
“Through the investigation, we found out that there is a lack of fire separation between the garage and the rest of the house, which is somewhat indicative of the year the house was built,” he said. Houses built today have complete sheetrock between the garage and the house which would slow down the fire. Wakula’s house, which was built in 1965, did not.
The volunteer fire department was well within the time ranges for response, he said. By the time the 911 dispatchers get the call, it takes time for the volunteers to get from their homes to the fire station, and don their equipment.
Batzel was asked: Would the response have been faster if Brick had a paid career fire department?
He said there are many situations that require a certain number of personnel to respond.
“If you get a fire of this magnitude, you need a lot of equipment and a lot of personnel fast,” he said, and added that there were enough equipment and volunteers at the Wakula home.
Struggling volunteer fire departments in Brick, and throughout the state, don’t have an influx of people volunteering for fire service. Many volunteers are aging out, he said.
“Is there a transition that needs to start happening? Absolutely. We need to start transitioning into having [paid] personnel readily available to respond to various locations,” Batzel said. “Staffing is difficult. We’d like to have more personnel.”
The fire bureau determined that the fire started when the lithium battery exploded in one of three hoverboards that was charging in the garage.
Two of the family’s three dogs died of smoke inhalation. They thought all three dogs had died until one of them was spotted in the backyard. Two cats also made it out alive.
The family lost a motorcycle and two pickup trucks, which were incinerated in the fire.
It took a while for their insurance company to find a dog-friendly hotel, but one was located in Manchester, but it was not kid-friendly, Wakula said.
“It’s summertime at the Jersey Shore, so the insurance company couldn’t find us a place to rent,” she said.
Instead of paying rent for the family, the insurance company and Wakula agreed to a lump sum of $43,000 to purchase a camper. Her daughter, her daughter’s fiancé and three children are living in a second camper in Toms River.
The charred remains of the house are scheduled for demolition on August 10.
Meanwhile, proceeds from a GoFundMe page and from a July 31 fundraiser at Beacon 70 is being used to pay off a $30,000 balance on the second camper that will be used until their house can be rebuilt.
If you would like to donate, the GoFundMe page is “House Fire Relief for Brianna and Family”.
For more information about becoming a volunteer firefighter, visit brickfire.org
