CARROLLWOOD, Fla. — A family is searching for a new place to live after losing everything in a fire. The flames were contained to the attic of their Hillsborough County home but did enough damage to force them to start over.
Sunday night, Adelle and Lee Febus were at work when they got a call from their son.
“He said, ‘Mom, Mom, the house on fire!’” Adelle says. “I was just shocked. I couldn't believe it.”
Their son, Jeremy, was in his bedroom playing video games, when he noticed smoke coming through his air conditioning vent in the ceiling. He fought through thick smoke trying to find the source of the fire but couldn’t see it.
“The neighbor had to pull me out because I was suffocating in there,” he says.
Kristine Bostick is the neighbor who saw the flames shooting up through the roof.
“I ran straight over here and called 911,” she says. "I started banging on their front door. He had bright red shorts on because you couldn't really see; the smoke was already so thick in there. All I saw was the flash of his shorts.”
The fire collapsed the ceiling and the flames were concentrated near their A/C unit. Lee says the fire investigator on scene that night told him it started in the air handler. We reached out to Hillsborough County Fire Rescue on Friday to confirm the cause but haven’t heard back yet.
Lee says the unit was replaced a few months ago because the first one burned from possible faulty wiring. As they figure out exactly what went wrong and where they're going to live, they wish they had renter's insurance, something they didn't know about.
“I do feel sorry that we didn't have it,” Lee says. “I advise everyone who's a renter, please, even if it's $20 a month insurance, do it because it will relieve you when you lose and something like this happens to you.”
Friends and family set up an online fundraiser; they say that and their faith in God will see them through...
“They're helping out a lot,” Jeremy says. “We really appreciate it.”
The Red Cross is helping them pay for housing, but they are only in an Airbnb until Tuesday.
“This is our story,” Lee says. “Now we just got to start all over again.”
