A sixth-grader with a paper route saw smoke and stopped smoke damage in Deep Cove on Wednesday afternoon.
“I was delivering papers like usual,” explained Sylas Koop. But when he passed a tiny grey house on Strathcona Road, he heard a fire alarm ringing.
At first, he wasn’t worried.
“I just thought someone was baking something and they burnt it.”
Koop, 11, delivered copies of the North Shore News to a couple more homes before he doubled back.
The alarm was still going. The homeowner’s car wasn’t in the driveway.
“I knocked on the door a couple times to see if anyone was actually in there,” he said.
Not getting an answer, Koop knelt down, flipped up the mail slot and saw billowing smoke.
Luckily, Koop’s mother, Sherri, made a crucial decision just six months earlier.
“My mom thought it was time for me to have a phone,” he said.
After not getting through to his mom at first, Koop called his mom’s friend, Ainsley Wickerson. Sherri and Wickerson rushed to the scene.
By that point the alarm was silent but the smoke kept piling up, Koop explains.
“I walked up to meet him at the house and there was smoke coming out of the chimney,” Sherri says.
She called 911.
District of North Vancouver firefighters arrived and quickly realized a pot had been left heating on the stove. The fire crew cleared the house and brought in giant fans to clear the smoke.
The firefighters also lauded Koop for the job he did.
“I’m proud of him because he listened to that voice inside,” Sherri said. “He didn’t just walk away. He did the right thing.”
“It’s a job well done,” said District of North Vancouver assistant fire chief Kit Little. “It just proves that smoke detectors work.”
Besides praise from the firefighters, Koop said the homeowner also called to thank him for saving the house.
When the smoke cleared, one of the firefighters let Koop try on his jacket. It was a little big, but that might not always be the case.
“I want to be a firefighter when I grow up,” Koop said. “I really like to help people if they’re struggling.”
District of North Vancouver firefighters are running their door hanger program from July 8 to 15, reminding residents to be cognizant of being fire safe on their properties.
