By Jennifer Crossley Howard
The Anderson Independent-Mail
WILLIAMSTON, S.C. — A Sunday afternoon fire ravaged the house that a family of four had left only minutes earlier to go to the zoo and to eat lunch.
Firefighters pulled up to 209 Carrageen Drive and saw flames shooting through the roof around 1 p.m., said Whitefield Fire Chief Paul Drake. The address is near Midway Road.
“Once it started in the carport, it got to the roof real quick,” he said.
Only the charred outline of the garage remained after firefighters quelled the flames. One firefighter suffered heat exhaustion and was treated at the scene. By 2 p.m. he was doing better, Drake said.
Heather Willington, who rented the house with her boyfriend, left about 15 minutes earlier to take her 4-year-old daughter to eat lunch. Her boyfriend had just left to take their 2-year-old daughter to the Greenville Zoo.
“I ironed my clothing and ironed her clothing, and we left,” Willingham said. “We went to KFC and I saw the smoke as I was driving past Walgreens.”
Then she realized it was her house.
“I slammed on the brakes getting ready to run out, but a paramedic stopped me,” she said.
Willingham, who is 26, stood with her children, mother and boyfriend as firefighters poked at hotspots in the ceiling.
“I just can’t believe this,” she said. “I just don’t understand.”
The cause of the fire was undetermined on Sunday, Drake said. A large propane tank sat inside the garage, along with gas cans, Willingham said.
“They probably exploded,” she said.
The family had rented the one-story white house since November.
While some neighbors walked to the house offering drinks of water, others watched the scene from their front-porch swings and rocking chairs.
Firefighters from Piercetown and West Pelzer alternated with the Whitefield crew to relieve each other from the heat. They carried a few framed baby pictures and portraits to a red tarp; most were covered in ash and shattered.
Riley Ericson and Kalie Andrews of Anderson were driving home when they saw the flames. Kalie, who was driving, said she didn’t think twice about turning around. Her best friend died in a house fire a year ago.
“When we pulled up it was just the garage on fire, and we expected to hear people screaming or yelling,” Ericson said.
They heard nothing, but they spotted a Rottweiler in the backyard and rescued it. They later returned the dog to grateful owners, and told Willingham if she needed any clothes to call them.
“We’ve got plenty,” Andrews said.
The last week has been busy for firefighters in Anderson County. Whitefield responded to a late-Saturday house fire in Pelzer that killed a woman, Drake said. The station also helped extinguish a fire on Thursday at an abandoned house in Belton.
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