A fire was reported aboy 10 a.m. Monday morning at the Perry Lutheran Homes Willis Avenue campus when a build up of highly combustible lint ignited in a laundry room clothes dryer.
There were no injuries in the fire, which was detected and extinguished by Lutheran Homes employees prior to the arrival of the Perry Volunteer Fire Department, which investigated the blaze.
“The only thing we could figure was that some lint had gotten in there and started on fire,” said Perry Volunteer Fire Department First Assistant Chief Brian Eiteman.
As luck would have it, Eiteman happened to be at his regular job and was emptying the dumpster at the Perry Lutheran Homes before the fire was een reported.
“I was actually dumping the dumpster out behind there when the alarm started going off,” he said, “so I was actually there before the pager went off.”
Eiteman immediately responded and found the fire under control.
“The employees already had it out before I got on scene,” he said. “They used a fire extinguisher and put the fire.”
The fire-training skills Eiteman taught the Perry Lutheran Homes’ employees last fall paid off Monday morning.
“It was kind of ironic,” he said, “because I had just taught these people how to use a fire extinguisher last October, and one of the things we covered was if you completely use one extinguisher and it still doesn’t put the fire out, then you should immediately leave the building and let us get there and take care of it, and that’s exactly what they did. We’re the ones with the big guns.”
I’ve known two families that lost a house due to a dryer lint fire, and my dryer has caught fire — fortunately, I was standing right there and saw it happening. Clean the filter regularly, and clean the exhaust tube, too. And we don’t run the dryer at night or when no one’s home.
Agree with Robin Conklin!! I never run mine and leave the house either.