Couple recall harrowing escape from fire; credit puppy to saving their lives

Desiree Brewer didn’t think twice about jumping off a balcony, realizing it was her only escape from the flames that engulfed her family’s Kalispell home on Aug. 20.

“I was the last person out of the house,” she said.

A week after the blaze, Brewer and her boyfriend Daniel Works recounted their escape, the shock of it all still sinking in, their voices tinged with the exhaustion of rebuilding their lives.

At the couple’s side was their puppy Montana, an Alaskan husky and yellow Labrador mix. The couple credits Montana to saving their lives and the life of daughter Brooke Brewer when the dog alerted them to the fire. The family was sleeping soundly when the fire started around 3 a.m. outside the home they were renting on Tronstad Drive.

“We wouldn’t be here if Montana hadn’t woke us up,” she said.

Montana, who turns 1 next month, tried to wake up Works first.

“I could feel her nudging me and licking my arm like she wanted to get up on the bed. I kind of ignored her,” he said, chalking up her behavior to puppy antics. “She ran downstairs to Brooke’s room and was scratching on her door. Brooke woke up and let her in the room and she came in, kind of turned around and ran right back up to our bedroom upstairs.”

“She jumped on the bed, she was like standing above me, licking my face, nudging me with her nose on my face and chin and almost making whistling sounds and woke me up enough and jumped off the bed and stood at my bedroom door,” he continued.

Grabbing his attention, his gaze turned to the bedroom door.

“I could see toward the dining room kitchen area and it was lit up like there was a light on. There shouldn’t have been a light on,” he said.

He got out of bed and went to check it out.

“I get to the dining area and I look out our slider doors and the whole front of the house is on fire. Our Jeep is on fire. I turn around and go back down the hall. I make it about two steps and the slider doors busted out and the flames came shooting in. I could feel the glass on my back as I’m running down the hall and I’m yelling for help,” he said.

Desiree was still in the bedroom sleeping.

“I wake her up, yelling, ‘Get out of the house. Get out of the house, we gotta go,’” he said, and then ran down to Brooke’s room to wake her up.

Outside, a neighbor was on the phone with 911. Works and Brooke made it outside. Desiree was trapped in the upstairs bedroom. The door to the balcony was the only way out. The balcony, located at the back of the house, wrapped around to the front porch which was engulfed in flames.

“That was the only way out. I almost didn’t make it out of the house,” she said, with a long exhale.

Without a moment to lose, she went to unlock the dead-bolted door as the intensity of the heat enveloped her body.

“I couldn’t get it open fast enough and I just felt this heat like I’d never felt in my life and I took a breath. It was like my last breath in the house and I couldn’t even breathe. It was so hot and felt so full of toxins,” she said.

Then she jumped.

“My foot is really messed up from an old injury and there’s no way I — it’s amazing what you do in desperate situations. You don’t even think,” she said, just act.

With firefighters dispatched to the scene, what took about 20 minutes seemed like double the time to the couple. The couple said the firefighters eventually had to hook up to a hydrant after running out of water.

“Luckily enough, those hydrants were there,” Works said, referring to their recent installation as part of a new subdivision.

WITH EVERYONE accounted for, which included their dog Bandit and cat Frisco, they have yet to find Honey, a cat belonging to Works’ mother. He said they were going to take care of it for the week while his mother had surgery and had just picked up the cat the day of the fire.

“There have been sightings of him but not lately,” Desiree said.

Honey is a 10-year-old orange-colored male with a white chest and white paws.

Following the fire, the response for clothing and essentials was immediate with assistance from the Red Cross, family and friends.

“We lost everything. We just had the clothes on our back at the time,” Desiree said. “The people who came to our rescue that were right on the scene as we got out, they were there with shoes and clothes.”

“We’ve received an abundance of clothing, love and support from the community. This has been overwhelming and we can’t thank everybody enough for the prayers, and the kindness and the love they are giving us,” she said.

She said the Department of Motor Vehicles was also helpful in expediting the process of obtaining copies of their driver’s licenses, which they needed as forms of identification to access bank accounts.

The immediate need now is to find another place to rent that allows animals, optimally for a year. The home on Tronstad Road was a complete loss. Without renter’s insurance at the time of the fire, the family will also have to start from scratch with furnishings. Even a vacation rental for a few months would be fine for the couple if it meant they could be reunited as a family.

Currently, Desiree and Works are staying above her brother’s garage, which doesn’t have running water, while Brooke, who starts her senior year of high school this week, stays with friends.

“So we’re separated and I’d like to have us all back together,” Desiree said.

Yet, they remain practical that it might not happen for a while due to the housing shortage in Flathead County.

“We can’t even get a rental car,” she said, after the couple’s two vehicles burned in the fire.

She said the rental company their car insurance works with told them there are 18 reservations ahead of them. Works was able to save Brooke’s vehicle and, in the meantime, is borrowing a neighbor’s vehicle.

Getting their lives back in order has been like a full-time job.

“We get exhausted. There’s all this business stuff and phone calls. Just shutting off the utilities at our house was a nightmare. Trying to get that stuff done. There’s a big long list of stuff we have to take care of. We’re just trying to survive right now,” Desiree said.

An added challenge in all of it is that Desiree struggles to hear after her expensive Bluetooth-enabled hearing aids burned up in the fire. Works said even losing minor things, a toothbrush, a cellphone — or reaching for an item you used every day that’s no longer there — makes the experience more surreal and the loss of irreplaceable mementos is heartbreaking.

“Yeah, it’s the sentimental things,” Desiree said.

She expressed sadness for her 17-year-old daughter, whose father died of cancer almost two years ago when it brought to mind the clothes of his she had kept, burned in the fire.

“I feel for her because she’s already been through something life-changing, losing her dad, and not even two years later losing everything,” Desiree said.

The couple said a fire inspector has told them the cause of the fire cannot be determined and calls from the Daily Inter Lake to fire departments for more details have gone unreturned. It could have been a faulty exterior outlet or porch light, but those are only possibilities.

“Everything burned so hotly. It was so hot, and burned for so long,” she said.

“Even though it’s been tragic we’ve been blessed in so many ways,” she said.

Although Kalispell has changed rapidly in size, Desiree maintains there is still a sense of community based on how her family has been supported.

“I’m a fourth generation from here and Brooke’s a fifth generation, but you know, our community’s changing and it’s growing, but the way they’re helping us out — they’re pulling together — has just been so impressive and amazing. We still have that community support here. We haven’t lost that yet.”

To assist the family with expenses a GoFundMe fundraiser has been set up under Desiree Brewer’s name at https://www.gofundme.com. A spaghetti dinner benefit is also planned at 6 p.m. Sept. 2 at the Eagles, 37 First St. W., Kalispell.

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.