‘He went to rescue a dog and found me’
by frank abderholden fabderholden@stmedianetwork.com February 25, 2011 8:44PM
Kevin Westre at his home in Lake Bluff where a fire threatened his life and destroyed his house. | Joe Cyganowski~for Sun-Times Media
Article Extras
Updated: April 27, 2011 4:45AM
When confronted with danger, people either flee or fight.
“I went to fight it,” said Kevin Westre, 49, of Lake Bluff when he was suddenly confronted by “a wall of flame” last Sunday morning in his home on Woodland Road.
That decision was nearly fatal, but he was lucky. Three police officers, all of whom will receive commendations Monday night from the Village Board, pulled the unconscious Westre out of the building after breaking down an unused door with a battering ram.
“I grabbed the fire extinguisher and that’s the last thing I remember,” Westre said. “Next thing I know I wake up in the intensive care unit of (Northwestern Lake Forest Hospital).
“I remember opening my eyes and seeing the police officers, my family and friends looking at me in shock, and I’m looking at them in shock,” Westre said Friday from his parents’ house in Lake Forest.
It was 3:59 a.m. Sunday when Westre got out of bed to let his black Labrador, Bella, out into a fenced area of his back yard. As he does every morning Westre walked back through the house and kitchen before entering the family room of the ranch-style house.
“It was just a wall of flames and it put me right out,” said the electrician, who works at the Northwestern Hospital medical complex in downtown Chicago.
In the meantime, Officer Damon Schmidt was driving through the Metra station parking lot when he noticed a haze on Woodland Street, said Police Chief William Gallagher.
“He recognized it as smoke and he looked down the street, and saw a glow from a home totally engulfed in flames,” Gallagher said.
After calling into emergency dispatch, Schmidt tried to suppress the fire with an extinguisher so he could get inside to see if the house was occupied. But the fire was too intense at the front door.
Two other police officers, James Reynolds and Thomas Vinson, arrived on the scene. They also used their extinguishers and made their way around the house looking for a way inside.
Schmidt used his battering ram to break some windows on the southeast side of the building, a former duplex, where the old front door was located. At that point he heard a sound and thought it might be a trapped dog.
He used his battering ram on the door, but it only opened partially because of furniture on the other side. That doorway was no longer used after the house was converted. Schmidt crawled inside and stumbled on Westre’s feet.
Schmidt then called for help. He and Reynolds grabbed a foot and dragged Westre outside. Bella was all right and still in the back yard.
“I’m glad he was an animal lover,” said Westre. “He went to rescue a dog and found me.”
In his letter of commendation to Schmidt, Gallagher said: “It is very clear that your attention while on routine patrol, your decisive response and your disregard for your own personal safety resulted in saving this man’s life.
“I would like to commend your actions, as well as the actions of Officer Reynolds and Officer Vinson, and thank all of you for a job very well done,” the chief wrote.
Westre’s father, Ben, feels the same way.
“If it had not been for the officer noticing it on his rounds, things would be very different around here,” he said of his son’s brush with death. Gallagher said that Westre’s carbon monoxide level (36) at the hospital was nearly fatal.
“It’s amazing what these guys had done,” said Westre.
That fact sank in as he walked through the charred house to get his car keys and whatever else he could salvage.
“Just to see what they went through,” he said. “The small little space where I was and the things that were melted and destroyed.”
The cause of the fire has not been determined. Westre noted there have been two other house fires on his block this year.
“If it (bad luck) really happens in threes, I hope we’re done,” he said.
His work crew from downtown also made him feel special when the general foreman arrived with a suitcase.
“It had new work boots, pants, shirt, sweat shirts, casual wear, socks and T-shirts. That’s the people I work with every day,” he said proudly.
Westre will be celebrating his 50th birthday today, a milestone he reached because of three police officers who went above and beyond.
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