At five in the morning, Aaron Gray of Prestatyn, Wales, heard his small kid ask for a drink. The sun had not even begun to rise at that point.
The father, who had served in the Royal Welsh Army in the past, got up and groggily poured some milk into a glass for his son. When he was getting ready for bed, he saw that there was a sliver of intense orange light through the blinds on his window. After looking outdoors, he was confronted with a horrifying scene.
The house next door was completely consumed by the fire that broke out. Aaron, in a state of panic, sprinted to get dressed and then immediately dialed for assistance. “While I was running about and calling the fire department,” he explained, “I put my clothes on.”
When Aaron made that call, it was 5:08 in the evening. At 5:22, the fire had spread to the entirety of the roof, and the home was dangerously near to collapsing. After running outside, Aaron began to feverishly pound on the windows and doors of the blazing home in an attempt to wake his sleeping neighbors.
Shauna Cox and her three children were all sound asleep inside the house when the door was closed. In addition to that, she had a friend over who was going to stay the night with her two children. They were unaware that their lives were in danger until Aaron broke down the front door of their house.
Aaron described his behavior as “kicking the door, pounding the door, slamming the glass, and screaming through the letter box.”
When Shauna eventually opened her eyes, she saw flames moving across the ceiling above her bed. She had been sleeping quietly for quite some time.
On her Facebook page, she posted, “Weekend just gone has been the most traumatic experience of my entire life!!” “Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that I would be startled awake to find the ceiling burning above my bed while my children slept soundly next to me. My companion and I went to sleep, only to be awoken by my front door being kicked in to inform us of the issue, which was that the entire roof was on fire!
The mothers snatched their children and dashed out the back door, where Aaron was waiting to assist in lifting the youngsters over the garden fence to a location that was more secure. Just in the nick of time, he was able to have everyone evacuated. At six in the morning, the fire had spread throughout the entire house. Aaron added, “I think we would be looking at a different outcome if I had left it five minutes later, as the fire department said.”
Officials from the fire department suspect that the fire began in an incineration bin located in the garden and swiftly moved to a shrub before starting to consume the house. Shauna and her buddy have no adequate words to express their gratitude to Aaron for saving their lives.
The grateful mother wrote in her journal, “Everything I’ve ever owned has been taken from me, but I still have my children, and that’s the only thing that matters to me right now.”
Aaron is an unsung hero! He didn’t think twice about charging into a burning building to save a group of strangers. We’re so glad he was awakened by his son that fateful morning!
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