Early Morning Fire Destroys Four Homes in Chapman Lane, Leaving Families Homeless

A devastating early-morning blaze swept through a densely populated section of Chapman Lane in The City, destroying four properties and forcing several families to leave.

The fire started just after three in the morning, following a loud explosion. Residents woke up in a panic and ran outside with barely any belongings.​

Among those hardest hit was Raphael Roberts, whose family managed a narrow escape as the flames quickly spread through the closely built houses. Roberts said his sons woke everyone up after hearing a sudden noise.

“I was sleeping, and around after three or something like that, one of my sons called my other son. I got a broken leg,” Roberts explained, describing the scramble to evacuate his family members in the dark. 

“He’s the slowest person in the house. It started from the middle, at the end of this house, and caught the house over here. Then the wind blew it straight onto the whole house and caught us, and then it caught the fourth house.”

Roberts said the fire moved so fast that his family had no time to retrieve their belongings or get dressed before escaping into the night. “It’s a good thing my wife … had on a pants and a shirt sleeping in, or she would have been exposed too, you know what I’m saying? But all the boys came outside in their bare boxers; four of us made it outside in bare boxers.”

Now, Roberts and his family are unsure about their future as they wait for emergency help and a place to stay. “We haven’t got a place to stay right now,” Roberts said, pointing out that his girlfriend and young child were forced to seek shelter with relatives while they await news from government officials.

“Right now, before we know it, we haven’t got no place to go. The Minister said he would get back to us later this evening, so we hope that by this evening we get some place to really go.”

For other residents in the immediate vicinity, the fire was a stark reminder of how quickly fire can spread through tightly packed neighbourhoods.

Thomas Felicien, who lives right behind where the fire started, described waking up to a loud boom before taking desperate measures to protect his own property from the speading flames.

Chapman Lane resident Thomas Felicien says his home sustained minor damage and took measures to ensure the fire did not spread to his property. (Photo Credit: Ricardo Roberts)

“I got up about four o’clock. I was sleeping sound and I heard a bang, boom,” Mr Felicien recalled. “I saw this big blaze in the air when it came in the back of the house. So the first thing I did, I grabbed the little hose they have there and set it up. I ran, let the dogs out, and then started to spray with the hose to keep it wet so the fire wouldn’t catch.”

Even though neighbours told him to stay back, Felicien kept trying to put out the fire around his home until it got too hot. “Everybody was shouting at the time to come away from there, telling me don’t go up in there. But I persisted in doing it because to lose a house at this kind of time is very hard,” he said. 

He expressed relief that his own home was safe, though he lamented how close the structures were. “I always have said that these houses are too close. We were lucky that the wind wasn’t blowing high; if the wind was blowing high, it would have been much worse.”

Longtime resident Marquita Campbell lost everything. Her family home, passed down through generations, was completely reduced to ash within minutes, leaving her and her two adult children with nothing.

Standing helplessly in the street with her two adult children, Marquita Campbell could do nothing but watch her ancestral home burn to the ground. (Photo Credit: Ricardo Roberts)

“About 3:35 this morning, I was awoken by a loud explosion next door to me,”  Campbell said. “When I managed to look through my bedroom window, I saw that the house next door was engulfed in flames. So I then alerted my daughter to wake up. We had to get out of the house. Human first instinct is to try to save whatever you can save, but then the flames came into the house and the smoke was black, and you just had to get out.”

Campbell spoke of the immense emotional toll of watching her family legacy disappear before her eyes while she stood helplessly in the street. 

“What I grew up in, what belonged to my grandparents, is just gone today. I have nothing. I actually ran over the hose in my bare underwear, so I saved nothing. I don’t even have anything to put on my back; I was just given these clothes. I just lost everything.”

Campbell said the home was uninsured. She noted that government representatives and emergency responders had visited the scene to assess the damage and discuss temporary housing.

“It happened so fast you can’t do anything but stand and watch all your hard-earned money just go in flames, and you can’t do anything about it but just watch it burn,” she said.

Fire officials are investigating what caused the explosion and fire. Meanwhile, people who lost their homes are depending on help from the community and waiting for emergency social services.

(RR)