GRAND MEADOW – A family is thankful they installed a heat detection system in their home a half-dozen years ago because it saved their lives late last week.

Saturday, February 03, 2001

GRAND MEADOW – A family is thankful they installed a heat detection system in their home a half-dozen years ago because it saved their lives late last week.

Jeff Johnson and his three children, ages 8, 6 and 2, were awakened about 3:45 a.m. Friday when their heat detector system started sounding in their home at 413 N. Main St. The alarm allowed Johnson and his children to escape unharmed.

Their home, however, sustained extensive damage and possibly could be totaled, Johnson said Friday morning.

Johnson said he and his children were asleep upstairs in the two-story home when the alarm in their home sounded. He quickly rounded up his children and they started down the home’s back stairs to escape.

Johnson said the four had to retreat to a bedroom and exited through a window onto the garage below and then down off the garage. He said his children listened to him throughout the successful escape.

Blankets they had gathered to cover their faces with from smoke were put down over the snow on the ground because they had escaped from their home in bare feet.

"We got out alive; we made it as a family," Johnson said.

Residents jumped into action right away to assist the family, with clothes for the children being dropped off by 6 a.m. Friday.

The children’s school books were burned in the fire, too, Johnson said, and arrangements were being made by the school to help keep the students on track with their school work.