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Boy Alerts Family to Fire in Home

KINGSTON — A young boy is being credited with saving his family and others when fire hit an apartment building early Friday in Luzerne County. As the rain...

KINGSTON -- A young boy is being credited with saving his family and others when fire hit an apartment building early Friday in Luzerne County.

As the rain came pouring down, firefighters came rushing in to battle a fire at an apartment building on South Atherton Avenue in Kingston, a place where Ashton Tyrrell, age 10, lives with his family.

"I just heard fire alarms. I woke up and I saw all the smoke," Ashton recalled.

The boy's family believes his quick-thinking boy is essentially the reason they and four others inside the five-unit building got out safely.

Ashton said he remembered what to do in case of a fire thanks to a tour he took of a fire station.

"I ran into my parents' room and said, 'Mom, dad there's smoke all over the place. You have to wake up!'"

"We were all sleeping. It was probably close to 3 a.m. He came knocking at our bedroom screaming there was alarms going off and smoke and we got up. We got her up, got them out. They ran down, the two of them banging on doors getting everyone out," said Ashton's father Matthew Thomas.

Most of the damage in this fire was contained to the second and third floor. Fire officials say they were able to contain the fire because of the fast response from crews from all over Luzerne County.

"The departments that all responded had good man power, so we were in pretty good shape," said Kingston Assistant Fire Chief Len Chesterfield.

People who lived there lost a lot of their belongings and most told us they did not have insurance. But the silver lining is that no one got hurt.

"You can buy new stuff. You can find new stuff, you know. You can always get stuff but everyone is fine, no one hurt that's the most important thing," said Matthew Thomas.

The Red Cross is helping all of the people forced out by the fire.

Firefighters say one person was taken to the hospital for breathing in smoke.

A fire marshal is looking for the cause.

 

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