- Two teen girls escaped a fire in their home early Monday morning.
- Their parents were working and their mom quickly rushed to the scene.
- There were no injuries, and the fire department also saved two pets.
- Video shows the mom's reaction to her daughters' escape from the fire.
Two teen girls, 12-year-old Lucia and 14-year-old Meili Leon, were fast asleep in their Fond du Lac home when, at around two in the morning, Meili was woken up by the family’s fire alarm. Their mom Martina Leon said Meili rushed to get her sister and the two looked to find a way to escape the house, but it was full of smoke.
Martina Leon said she was working third shift when she checked the feed from a camera in her family’s home to see a light from the stove and a missed call from her daughter. She quickly rushed to the scene.
“I was shaking all the way over here,” Leon said. “I got back pain from how tense I got,.”
She says she was relieved to find her daughters safe outside when she arrived at the scene, after they used the ladder to climb from their second story window to the ground.
“I am very proud of them acting fast, not overthinking it,” Leon said.
Fond du Lac Fire Department Division Chief Jason Roberts was at the scene Monday morning, about 20 minutes after the fire. He said the parents did the right thing by giving their teens the ladder.
“They did a great job with preparing their youth for staying home alone and knowing what to do in case an emergency did happen,” Roberts said.
Roberts said first responders also saved the family’s two dogs and bunny. They found the dogs unresponsive and had to use pet oxygen masks on them. Now, Roberts said the dogs are doing well.
Neighbor Pam Entringer said she’s a friend of the family and woke up to the two teens at her door in the middle of the night.
“Somebody was pounding very, very hard on my door—and I thought it was somebody else—but it was the two little girls from across the street,” Entringer said.
She says the community is supporting the family.
“These people are some of the nicest people you're ever going to meet,” Entringer said. “And the daughters are very intelligent as they knew which way to go and what to do. And they were so sad."
Leon says their kitchen was destroyed by the fire, but she believes the most important thing is that her family is safe.
