Photo courtesy of Ross Lavigne

By Hayley Ferguson

Fire Hero

Alberta man wakes campers as RV burns

Jul 12, 2019 | 8:05 AM

MEDICINE HAT – What started out as a fun weekend for Jeremy Daffy last Friday turned into anything but.

He and friends were camping at the Cottonwood Golf Course and when Daffy decided to head back to his own site, he noticed something wasn’t right.

“At first I thought it was a bonfire. From that far away, it kind of looked like that, but after you got closer you could tell that it was definitely something that was on fire and just something that didn’t look right,” Daffy said.

The thing on fire was an RV.

From there Daffy sprung into action.

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“I mean I kind of just did what felt right and ran into the trailer and the door was kind of already starting to melt,” he described. “So I actually ended up kicking the door in a little bit and prying it open and ran into his burning trailer and woke up and got all three occupants out of there.”

Daffy then ran to wake up everybody in the trailers on either side of the fire.

Richard Lant was one of those asleep in his RV.

He can’t quite put into words how thankful he is that Daffy banged on their door.

“I thanked him profusely. It was a great thing for him to see that, recognize it and get over here and save lives,” he continued. “I mean, nobody lost their lives and that’s the important thing. Everything else can be replaced.”

Daffy says he didn’t even think about not rushing to help.

“To be honest with you, you don’t really think of it once you’re already in there. How hot that trailer was and getting by those flames it was kind of, I just didn’t think,” he said. “I just knew how much time I had because of how close the propane tanks were.”

Fire Prevention Officer Carter Gramlich says that if the people inside the trailer had waited for their smoke detector, the fire could have trapped them inside.

“Do what you can. We don’t want people to put themselves in harm’s way, but if you recognize a situation like that where you have the chance to save somebody or alert somebody to a fire, you risk a little bit sometimes to make sure everybody gets out safely,” Gramlich said.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

The fire department says it will bring in private investigators to have a look and hope to know more information next week.