Remembering Lexy: Finding good in tragedy

By Gary Bowker
Winfield Courier – October 15, 2013

(Editor’s note: Former Winfield City Fire Marshal Gary Bowker wrote this article for a class he taught at a fire training institute.)

As the welcome cool of another fall season begins, I am reminded that it is National Fire Prevention Week. And with fire prevention week, my thoughts are vividly brought back to a terrible early morning house fire that I responded to nine years ago, that claimed the life a beautiful 13-year-old girl, Alexis Crittenden, affectionately called Lexy.

She was a very bright and outgoing young lady who was loved by those who knew her. She had a fun personality, and was involved with middle school activities. She was a member of the local swim team and was self-taught at the piano. She was a sister, a daughter and a granddaughter.

Even today, when I drive past the address I am momentarily transported back to that night. The lessons to be learned from this tragic fire are not new — lessons that are just as relevant today as they were then. Maybe even more so now, due to the speed and intensity by which a fire can rapidly spread throughout today’s modern wood frame home, leaving perhaps only a minute or two to react. Left behind are Lexy’s mother, her sisters and her grandparents. They are the ones who must cope every day with their loss, as real now as it was that horrific night.

I hope this story will serve as a reminder, to motivate you again to remain vigilant in preventing a fire in your home or workplace. By doing so, maybe we can prevent the loss of another young life from ending way too soon. Now, journey with me back to that horrible night. …

The fire

Shortly before 4:30 a.m. on Nov. 9, 2004, the Winfield 911 emergency dispatch tones blared out, “Attention, Winfield Fire, we have the report of a house on fire with a child trapped inside in the 900 block of East Eighth Avenue.”

I immediately got out of bed and threw on a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt and was out the door, responding from my home. As I was pulling out of my driveway, I flipped on the emergency lights of the fire marshal’s car, and the radio again blared out, this time with the voice of Winfield Fire Captain Larry Johnson. “Engine 71, Quint 71 are on scene. We have a fully involved two-story wood frame dwelling, with a person still inside. Recall all off-duty firefighters to come to the station. Engine 71 has command.”

As I turned off College Street onto East Eighth Avenue, I could see the ominous orange glow in the crisp night sky six blocks to the west. When I arrived, I noted heavy flames rolling out the front windows of the home reaching upwards to the second floor. I was met with the grieving cries of a mother and her two daughters being attended to across the street by Winfield EMS personnel, who had also just arrived.

My mouth was so dry I didn’t think I could swallow, as my heart was pounding. As I opened the trunk and started putting on my turnout gear, Winfield Police Officer Gary Bortz ran over to my location and asked what he could do to help. As we looked at each other, we both instinctively knew this was not going to have a good outcome.

As I approached the home, I was met by the next door neighbor coming down her front steps. I asked, “Is everyone out of your house?” She shook her head yes and tearfully said, “There’s a little girl still inside there.”  I said “I know.”

I noticed even the leaves in the front yard along with the vehicles parked in the driveway were beginning to burn. I thought to myself, “My God, how long has this fire been burning?”

As I made my way along the side of the house following E-7’s hose line towards the rear, I met Fire Captain Larry Johnson and firefighter Jennifer Love, from Engine 71 who was just exiting from a rear bedroom window, where heavy dark smoke was pouring from the opening.

Captain Johnson stated that family members had informed him that the little girl was believed to be trapped in the rear of the home. Firefighters immediately broke out the only rear window where fire was not showing and entered to conduct a primary search of the area. A quick sweep revealed this to be a bedroom with nobody found in that room. Due to the very hot and rapidly deteriorating fire conditions inside the home, firefighters were forced to evacuate.

As I continued my 360-degree survey of the structure, I could see heavy fire through a large picture window located over the stairwell landing on the west side of the residence. A vortex of flames was blasting up the stairwell from the first floor living room into the second floor hallway, where I could see the bedroom doors were standing wide open. Fire had already taken possession of the second floor and was rapidly extending into the attic space.

Firefighting operations were then focused on knocking down the fire in the front portion of the structure by attacking the flames through the front door and then attempting to reach the open stairway and get to the second floor as quickly as possible. I noted that the single 1-3/4-inch attack line being used was not knocking the fire down in the front portion of the home as quickly as I had expected. A second hose line was brought into service and allowed the initial attack crew to advance up the stairwell without being cut off by the flames behind them.

As I continued to monitor fire conditions and progress being made, I intercepted three people that night, all of whom were relatives of the victims and were attempting to run to the front door and enter the home, crying that Lexy was still in there. What do you say to them? The third person who attempted to enter was an older gentleman. As soon as I saw him, I could see that his eyes were fixated on the front door of the burning home as he crossed the street in front of Engine 71.

As I reached him at the sidewalk, I grabbed him by the shoulder and said, “Sir, you’re going to have to wait across the street.”  

He looked at me and said. “ You don’t understand; that’s my granddaughter in there,” and he attempted to move past me. I held on to him and assured him that we were going to find her as I led him back across the street. I will never forget the look of pain and horror in that grandfather’s face.  Since that night, I, too, have become a grandfather, and my heart is still broken for him.

A short time later, firefighters gained access to the second floor and had a good knock-down going. Within minutes, firefighters located 13 year-old Lexy in her second floor bedroom closet. It was too late. Firefighters reverently covered the little girl in a white sheet and gently picked her up and carried her lifeless body down the stairs. She was taken out the back door of the residence to an awaiting ambulance in the alley. This was done in order to spare the family members the pain of seeing her brought out through the front door covered in a white sheet.

It should be noted that while this was being done, the fire was still raging in the attic space above the firefighters.

The investigation

During my initial examination of the fire scene, I was a bit taken aback by the fact that the living room looked so empty. Clearly, the front living room had experienced flashover prior to our arrival and had the greatest amount of fire damage. I soon discovered, however, that most of the living room furnishings had been largely consumed by the fire. I couldn’t immediately recall any previous fire scenes I had investigated where the room contents were so completely consumed with the structure still standing.

During the investigation, it was determined that the fuel load in this room (mostly synthetic fuels) was a major contributing factor in the speed and growth of the fire. The living room furnishings consisted of two large sofas, several easy chairs, a coffee table, two end tables, an entertainment center with a stereo with large speakers and a TV. These furnishings are typical in almost all homes and offices today.

Three of the four living room walls had large window openings that were just beginning to vent flames during the initial call to 911 by a neighbor. Within approximately three minutes, Engine-71 and Quint 71 arrived on-scene to find the structure well involved. After a thorough investigation by state and local fire investigators, it was determined that this fire started as the result of a lighted candle left burning overnight in the front southeast corner of the living room on top of a stereo speaker. The burning candle was sitting on a paper plate filled with dried potpourri, sitting about 10 inches away from window curtains. The open stairwell was located in the opposite corner from the area of origin.

The living room’s synthetic fuel loading, the corner configuration of the candle, the abundance of fresh air available from the windows and the open stairwell’s acting as a chimney to the second floor created the perfect “firestorm” conditions found upon our arrival. This is why, as I previously mentioned, two 1-3/4-inch attack lines were needed to contain the fire in the living room.

The fire was discovered by a teenage daughter who was alerted by seeing flames in the living room from her rear first floor bedroom. She reported seeing the fire burning in the southeast corner of the living room and tried unsuccessfully to extinguish it with a pitcher of water before escaping through the rear kitchen door.

Her screams for help woke her mother who was asleep in the front second floor bedroom over the living room. The mother reported smelling a hot odor as she opened the bedroom door, only to find flames leaping up the stairwell, just outside her bedroom. She described the heat as so intense, she thought she was going to die in that hallway. She could not breathe, and she heard and felt her hair singeing and burning as she ran through the upstairs hallway to her second teenage daughter’s bedroom. After awakening the second daughter, both escaped through the rear bedroom window by climbing onto the roof. Only after climbing down and meeting with the first daughter who had just escaped from the first floor did all three family members realize that Lexy was not among them. Panic followed, and their desperate screams alerted neighbors who then called 911 after the fire was well under way.

It was also discovered that the only smoke alarm in the entire home was located in a second floor bedroom, and the battery had been removed. Time after time and year after year, this similar tragic scenario plays out somewhere in America. Most people think this won’t happen to them. But we in fire service profession know that it can.

Lessons learned

Never leave lighted candles unattended.  Be sure they are kept well away from nearby combustibles and are sitting in a safe candle holder.

Insure there is an operational smoke alarm located in each sleeping room and on every level of the home. I recommend dual sensor smoke alarms which have a quicker reaction time to a fire.

Sleep with the bedroom doors closed — especially in a two-story home where the bedrooms are located near an open stairwell. This can allow extra time for escape or rescue.

Have a family escape plan with two ways out.  Be sure everyone is aware of the plan, and practice it at night. One of the keys to success is to insure the kids can open their bedroom windows. If the window won’t open, make sure the kids know it’s OK to break out the glass. But this must be discussed and planned for ahead of time, not after a fire has started.

Have a designated meeting place outside the home for everyone to meet and do a head count. Once you’re out, never go back inside. Especially if you have small children, for they will follow you.

Call 911 immediately. Seconds count. Call from a cell or a neighbor’s phone.

Community impact

It is tragic when any child dies. But that tragedy seems to be magnified when that child is a wonderful young girl who dies in a horrific house fire. This fire had a major impact on our small Kansas community of 12,000 people in the days and months that followed.

First, the community’s fire safety awareness level was elevated because of this fire. The local press and television media had several days of coverage regarding this news story. This was the time to put forth our fire prevention message, yet remain sensitive to the family and friends who were grieving.

Our department saw an increased number of requests to install home smoke alarms and to conduct home fire safety visits. Local merchants donated additional smoke alarms for community distribution.

In addition, we had requests for assistance from a number of parents and teachers, whose children that knew Lexy, and were now experiencing nightmares about the fire. A referral organization was then found that specialized in crisis counseling for children and fire victims, and those in need were directed to them. Lexy’s seventh grade class designed and funded a project to have refrigerator magnets and calendar stickers mass produced for our department to hand out as a reminder for citizens to change the batteries in their smoke alarms. A college scholarship fund was started in Lexy’s name by her family, and a member of her graduating high school class was awarded the scholarship in 2009.

Several months after the fire, while I was visiting with Lexy’s mother and grandmother, they asked how they might become involved to help get the message of fire safety out to the public, in hopes of preventing someone else from having to experience the loss and grief they were going through. Several ideas were discussed and two programs emerged. One was a public speaking campaign to local civic groups, where Lexy’s mother and grandmother could tell their story about the fire. The other project, a 25-minute public education video, was produced by our local Southwestern College media and journalism students as a class project. The video focused on the terrible events of that night as described by Lexy’s mother and then concludes with home fire safety and survival tips from the fire marshal. This video was requested by several neighboring fire departments and was shown during public education events following the fire.

Lexy’s death was not in vain. Lexy had a profound impact on our community that was deep and long lasting with the life-saving lessons that this fire teaches us. But they were lessons purchased at a very dear price. Those lessons continue to be taught today by firefighters across America.

Some of you will be in contact with your local fire departments this month during their annual visits and may only be casually listening to their message. I challenge each of you not just to hear what is being spoken, but to listen intently, and remember Lexy and the message she brings.

Gary Bowker is a retired Fire Chief with the U.S. Air Force, and has served as Fire Chief with the Sumner County Rural Fire District 10. Bowker retired as Fire Marshal with the City of Winfield and has over 39 years of fire service experience. He has taught numerous courses with the National Fire Academy, U.S. Department of Defense, Butler County Community College and the University of Kansas Fire & Rescue Training Institute. He serves as a Kansas advocate with the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation’s Everyone Goes Home program and speaks frequently and has written numerous articles on firefighter life, safety and health issues. Bowker has been an instructor with nationally acclaimed FDIC and currently teaches a four-hour program, “Fighting Fires in Disposable Structures.” He is nationally certified as a Fire Officer II, Instructor II, Inspector II and  Certified Fire & Explosion Investigator, and he holds a B.Sc. degree in Fire Science Administration. Bowker can be reached at: glbowker@hotmail.com.

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