‘I didn’t realize how much it affected me’: House fire survivor urges safety planning

It’s Fire Prevention Week, and while it’s easy to procrastinate on fire safety planning, one woman who lost everything in a house fire earlier this year wants Winnipeggers to appreciate the importance of being prepared.
Tamara Bard told 680 CJOB’s The Jim Toth Show that the early-morning blaze on Jan. 16 of this year was life-changing.
Bard and her pets managed to survive the fire, which she says was deliberately set, but one resident of the home was killed and two others seriously injured.
“I had to up my therapy game after. I didn’t realize how much it affected me,” Bard said.
“Simple things like sirens in the neighbourhood… if they were too loud, I would shut down — I couldn’t deal with the sound. A neighbour having a bonfire, just simple things you wouldn’t think of. I can’t burn candles anymore. Little things.
“The sirens, you know you hear them in the city all the time, but you don’t really think too much about hearing them unless they get close to you.”
Since then, Bard said she’s taken precautions. While she lived in a basement suite during the January fire, she’s in a main floor suite at her current building, with two ways to get in and out of the building in case of emergency. She’s also more familiar with the people around her, who know about her traumatic past and are there to help.
“I know my neighbours very well, so that was a big thing for me — knowing the people,” Bard said.
“For fire safety here, the landlord actually put a big red bell fire alarm here, it’s more like a commercial-style fire system but it’s in a triplex.”
Bard’s advice is to have a household plan in case of fire, practice it, and stick to it — no matter how unnecessary it might seem.
“It might sound a little corny or whatever, but if you actually practice that, you’re not going to panic as much when it happens… if it happens.”
Justin Kutzak, public education officer with the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service, told 680 CJOB that campaigns like Fire Prevention Week are all about awareness — as no one thinks a house fire will happen to them, until it actually does.
The value of something as simple as a working smoke alarm, he said, cannot be understated.
“Whether apartment, condo, house, it doesn’t matter. Everybody needs one,” Kutzak said.
“Three out of five home fire deaths occur in homes where smoke alarms are missing or they’re not working.
“The classic thinking is, ‘I never thought it would happen to me’, so we have this week to remind people — check your smoke alarms, make sure you have a fire escape plan, carbon monoxide detectors are important as well, and know two ways out of every room in your home.”