By now we have all heard about the heroine nanny, Alyson Myatt, who rushed barefoot through flames to save the five-year-old boy in her care on March 23, 2010. She is a true "Super Nanny."But, firefighters say the story also brings a lesson for everyone, because of a mistake the nanny made. And, she doesn't have health insurance to treat her own burns so there is a web site for you to donate to help pay for her medical expenses.
The nanny's big mistake was not calling 911 earlier that day when she put out a small fire herself. An article, "Fire involving nanny rescue under state investigation" says, "Shelbyville fire chief Willard Tucker said Myatt believed she had extinguished that first fire, without a need to call the fire department for help.
'She said she put it out with some water and spoke with the owner of the property,' Tucker said.
But later, a loud noise, smoke and flames awakened the nanny, and she headed for the child's room. Myatt burned her feet and hands walking across a flaming hallway. The child was not hurt.
Tucker wishes she had called 911 at the first sign of trouble. However, 'It doesn't discount the events that took place and the risk she took to save Aden,' Tucker said.
Tucker believes firefighters would have found a smoldering fire before it put the boy and nanny at risk."
The heroine appeared on the Ellen Show and on the show Tonic.com gave her $20,000 to help with her recovery. To donate to her medical expenses please visit the tonic.com web site by clicking here.
6 comments:
One of the things that I still wonder as I read all of this is were there functioning smoke detectors in the house.
Okay I realize it may have not made a difference with the second fire, but I think of times that I have set them off in the kitchen while on duty.
Or in another case, when something cooked over in the oven while I was upstairs, and it started to create a lot of smoke. By the time it worked it ways up to me, the first floor was full of smoke.
As my WAH DB and I were airing out the place, I said Why didn't the detectors go off, and realized he didn't have them in there yet (new house).
One of the big things we can help some of our employers to do (this was a widower with 3 young kids, lots on his plate) is to make sure safety features like this are in place and functioning.
That's funny Lisa I was thinking the same thing. But people sleep thru smoke detectors all the time. I also am wary of giving money to a website. Since we care for other people's children in other people's homes we should always call 911. I know I have more strigent safety rules than the parents and I just tell the kids "Because I'm not going to let you get hurt on my time!" I found out the parents let the 9 year old stay home alone sometimes when I am not working?? I'd be fired in a minute if I did that. So call 911 that's what it is there for.
Melissa Bedford New Hampshire
Even if she'd called 911 earlier, it wouldn't be a guarantee that the fire wouldn't have restarted. My best friend lost everything years ago-photos, wedding dress, because they had a fire in the day. The FD came put out the fire, and then it rekindled later in the night when no one was there destroying everything. This is a "what if" scenario meant to downplay her heroism and assault her intelligence in my opinion.
Since she is working in someone elses house why not ask the parent(s) what they want her to do. I would call say I put out a fire should I call the fire dept. 99% if the parent isn't home they will say yes please call the fire dept to make sure everything is ok. They don't mind at all, it's their job.
I the fire was small enough to put out herself with water, I don't know that I would think to call the fire department, I'd assume everthing was fine.
There were several articles at the time that mentioned the smoke alarms going off.
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