Woman finds home on fire after being awakened by cat
 

Woman finds home on fire after being awakened by cat

By Laura Jean Grant
cape breton


Dogs may be man's best friend, but it was a cat that made the difference for one Whitney Pier woman during an early-morning house, fire Thursday.

Richard Bulley, deputy fire chief with the Cape Breton Regional Fire Service, said according to fire officials on the scene, a woman - in her early 20s - was awakened by her cat only to discover that a fire was ravaging the Henry Street home.

"The fire station got the call at 3:51 a.m. Thursday and they were on the scene until around 7 a.m.," he said.

"There was a young woman inside but her cat woke her up and she got out."

Firefighters who responded to the scene were confronted with a heavy, thick, black smoke as they went about extinguishing the blaze.

The interior of the house received extensive smoke and heat damage while the outside of the one-storey home appeared to have incurred minimal damage.

The woman, who is the daughter of the home's owner, was the only person in the building when the fire began, according to Bulley.

Efforts by the Cape Breton Post to contact the woman for comment were unsuccessful Thursday.

"She was very lucky that her cat woke her up because the fire was quite extensive," said Bulley. "It appeared to have started in the kitchen and appears to be accidental in nature."

He noted that early indications from firefighters on the scene are that the home did not have any working smoke detectors.


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