Life is still throwing curve balls…

On 7.10.15 at 2:30 in the morning Tali was awakened by an explosion. So were the neighbors in the building across from us and the neighbor upstairs…

As usual I can sleep through anything and it was an insistent push from Tali that was able to wake me. I had come back from a meeting at work and closed my eyes at 12:17 – I made the calculation that I could get 3 sleep cycles in if I fell asleep now as my first alarm is set for 4:45 am.

But when I heard glass crashing, I understood that I had to investigate. I got out of bed, realized that the first rain was falling heavily outside. I was fairly certain that the noise was perhaps the wind blowing something off the selves, but I had my hands up, because it seemed possible that someone was in the apartment and I was getting ready for fight or flight. As I rounded the corner leading to the living room, I saw large flames billowing up from the entire front of the refrigerator – something very unexpected… With the flame, black smoke caused me to grab Tali, push her into the hallway and I told her to wake the neighbors and get them out of the building. I knew that smoke was the number one killer and there was little time to spare. Outside the apartment I realized that I was still in my underwear and made the decision to get pants, I took a deep breath, ran back to our room and grabbed jeans from the closet, ran back out and put them on in the hallway. I didn’t have my contacts in, nor my glasses, nor my telephone and I started banging on the doors and yelling. At some point it occurred to me to check the electrical box in case it was an electrical fire that was being fed by electricity – I opened up the box and dropped all the fuses – I did not notice that any were down, but I was moving very quickly and I shut all the fuses – including the neighbor’s because I couldn’t remember which ones were ours, but I was surprised that there was electricity in the hallways and by the neighbor’s…

After waking most of the neighbors and getting them to wake the other neighbor’s, we all went outside and watched black smoke billow out of all the windows in the house. I asked if someone had called the fire dept. Eventually someone did, but it would appear that the neighbor was the first to call – he checked his phone and he first called the fire dept at 12:40 and then again at 12:49 – at which point he disconnected as they had arrived.

Downstairs we waited – I was in my jeans and Tali in her pajamas – eventually someone from the police gave me a shirt. The rain was coming down in torrents….