Updated 5 pm, Wednesday
Quick action by a neighbor, Oak Bluffs police, firefighters, and emergency medical personnel helped save the life of a woman who was overcome by smoke and unable to escape from a devastating house fire that broke out early Saturday morning at 132 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Jerilyn Dube, 52, continues to recover at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, where she was transported Saturday by medical helicopter, suffering from burns to her face and shoulder, and smoke inhalation.
Ray Rochon, her longtime companion who was in the house the couple shared, told The Times in a telephone call Wednesday, “She’s doing a lot better, she’s better than what she was two or three days ago.”
Mr. Rochon said there is still some concern about her breathing, and she remains on a ventilator due to swelling in her throat. But he said she is alert and responds to his jokes by squeezing his hand. “I try not to make her laugh too much,” he said.
Mr. Rochon said he and Ms. Dube are very grateful for all the support: “I mean, I’m overwhelmed with the generosity, and just want everyone to know how much we appreciate it.”
Investigators from the Office of the State Fire Marshal have determined the fire originated in the kitchen area near the stove, but they are waiting to interview Ms. Dube as they focus in on the specific cause. Mr. Rochon said he suspects the blaze might have originated with a stove burner.
Mr. Rochon has lived in the house for more than 30 years, and he and Ms. Dube, whom he refers to as Jeri and calls his wife, have lived together in the house for more than 20 years. Ms. Dube is a longtime employee of the Edgartown Post Office. Mr. Rochon, 65, is a retired AT&T installer, and senior vice-commander and bar manager at the VFW.
Oak Bluffs firefighters responded to an initial report of a kitchen fire just at 1:14 am. Later reports described a house fully engulfed in flames with people possibly still trapped in the building, Oak Bluffs Fire Chief John Rose said.
“When we first arrived, we encountered heavy fire,” Chief Rose said.
Precious minutes
Mr. Rochon was on his couch in the living room asleep. He is not sure what caused him to wake up. He said it may have been the smoke detectors. “When I jumped up, over by the kitchen stove and cabinets was fully engulfed, and I kept calling for her and calling for her, and that’s when I called 911 … It was pretty scary, I don’t know how I got out.”
Cliff Robinson likes to sleep with his window open a crack year-round. He awoke to the shouts of his neighbor Ray Rochon yelling for Jeri to “Get out, get out.”
Mr. Robinson, still visibly shaken from the experience, told The Times Saturday that when he ran across the street, Mr. Rochon was on his phone speaking to the 911 operators telling them to hurry. He told Mr. Robinson his wife was still in the house and directed him to the kitchen and the side door where he thought she might be.
“I was looking for her, I couldn’t find her,” Mr. Rochon said. “Cliff came over and we opened up the backdoor, which was close to the fire because the whole kitchen was engulfed by then, and she was on the floor.”
Under a low ceiling of smoke, Mr. Robinson saw Ms. Dube lying unconscious on the floor inside the kitchen and steps from safety. He entered the kitchen and he and Mr. Rochon pulled her as far as the doorway as police and fire sirens sounded in the distance.
Team effort
Firefighters and EMTs, several of them from nearby homes, quickly converged on the scene by vehicle and foot. Firefighter Jim Moreis, one of the first to arrive, used his radio to provide critical information to the fire station, where crews were assembling and rolling out their trucks.
A firefighter since the age of 15, Kevin O’Donnell, 23, comes from a family of Oak Bluffs firefighters and serves on a rescue truck commanded by his older brother. An employee of excavator Richard T. Olsen and Son in West Tisbury, he understands, as do any of the Island’s volunteer firefighters, that a full night’s sleep is never a guarantee.
He was asleep just one street away when the pager next to his bed sounded.
“I was in running distance so I just ran from my front door to the house,” he told The Times in a telephone conversation. When he stepped out of his house, he could smell smoke and see the flames.
At the house, Mr. O’Donnell heard Mr. Rochon yelling for help from the side door, where he was performing CPR on his stricken companion just outside the doorway. Mr. O’Donnell told the distraught Mr. Rochon he would take over from there.
“Chris Flanders showed up,” he said, “and I told him to radio in to the com center that it was a priority 1 and that she wasn’t breathing.”
“It was definitely a team effort,” Mr. O’Donnell said.
One of the first police officers to arrive was Michael Cotrone, who was on the midnight shift when he heard the call come over the radio. He estimated he and several other officers on duty that morning arrived within 90 seconds of the call.
Told someone was still in the building, Officer Cotrone said he and the other officers worked their way around the house. “That’s when we came to the door by the kitchen, and that’s where Mr. Robinson was. He had gone in first and dragged her out to that door,” he said.
Officer Cotrone said Chris Flanders, an EMS first responder, who had also just arrived, began performing CPR in the doorway. “Then the fire started to kind of come at us in the door, so we had to move,” Officer Cotrone said.
The men picked Ms. Dube up and moved her to the driveway and safety even as CPR continued. Another officer went for oxygen and an AED (defibrillator).
“In the 20 seconds it took to get the oxygen, Chris got her back to breathing,” he said, “and at that point we put the oxygen on her. That’s when the ambulance came. We got a stretcher, and got her out of there.”
Officer Cotrone praised the quick actions of Mr. Robinson and Mr. Flanders. He said the entire sequence of events “seemed like it took forever, but it probably all happened within a few minutes.”
Ms. Dube was transferred by MedFlight from Martha’s Vineyard Hospital to Massachusetts General that morning.
Inspecting the charred and heavily damaged house late Saturday morning, property owner Dick Mavro, his son, and a small group of friends said the property could be rebuilt. “All things considered,” Mr. Mavro, former Oak Bluffs building inspector, said, “we are lucky as long as Jeri is OK.”
11 minutes
The first 911 call was received at 1:14 am, Chief Rose said. He was on location within six minutes. The first truck arrived within six minutes and 30 seconds of the call. Ms. Dube was in the ambulance “and on her way to the hospital within 11 minutes of the call.”
“This is a volunteer fire department,” Chief Rose said with some pride.
As is normal procedure on Martha’s Vineyard, nearby Island towns provided mutual aid. Chief John Rose said one engine company responded from Edgartown to the fire, and Tisbury firefighters manned the Oak Bluffs station in the event another call came in while firefighters were engaged with the blaze on Pennsylvania Avenue. Edgartown and Tisbury emergency medical personnel also assisted. He praised the support of the Island towns and the members of his volunteer department. “It was a phenomenal response,” he said.
