After a rainy day at school, Gary Solomon was hungry for some French fries. His appetite went up in smoke Tuesday when an unattended cooking pot caused a grease fire in his kitchen.
At about 3:30 p.m., Gary, 16, got back to his house at 17 NE 18th St. He heated a pot on the stove then went to his room to change clothes.
Solomon’s mother, Alicia Solomon Burch, 31, was in her bedroom watching “Law & Order” when she noticed smoke coming from the kitchen.
She called for Gary to check the kitchen, gathered her daughters and left the house.
“I got up and got my important papers and was telling my girls to come out the back door, because I already saw that it was bad,” she said.
Solomon and his stepfather, Stanley Brown, 45, went into the room to clear out the smoke and tried to get rid of the pot.
Solomon wafted the smoke with a towel as Brown sprayed the stove with a fire extinguisher.
“It had a big blaze,” Brown said. “Like the whole house was on fire.”
Gary and Brown got out of the house as Solomon Burch waited outside in a tent with her daughters.
Gainesville Fire Rescue responded at about 3:45 p.m. GFR District Chief Richard Saulsberry said no one was injured.
Outside in the tent, Kelly DeRasmo, a GFR fire investigator, told the family the fire did little damage to the kitchen.
“It could have been a lot worse,” she said.
Contact Chris Alcantara at calcantara@alligator.org.
