Teen saves his family from Longwood house fire: 'It hasn’t really set in what’s happened'
Teen saves his family of 8 from Longwood house fire
A Florida family is thankful to be alive after a fire ripped through their house in Longwood. A teenager got his entire family of eight out of the home before the fire spread.
LONGWOOD, Fla. - A Florida family is thankful to be alive after a fire ripped through their house in Longwood.
A teenager got his entire family of eight out of the home before the fire spread.
The backstory:
A family of eight is now trying to salvage what they can after their home of two decades was destroyed in a fire.
"My brother came pounding on the door and yelling ‘Fire!’ and as soon as I opened my door, I could see it from my bedroom," explained Carter Sharpe.
It was 11:30 p.m. on Thursday when an ordinary evening for the Longwood family turned into chaos.
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The Sharpe family had lived in this six-bedroom home off Long Pond Drive for 20 years, but in minutes they lost nearly everything.
Ryan Sharpe's 16-year-old son spotted the danger first. He saw an orange glow reflecting in his bedroom window. It was so bright it was seen by drivers on I-4.
The 16-year-old didn’t hesitate, rushing through the halls to wake up his family.
"I opened my back porch to see, and the TV electrical wires were all on fire. I started waking everybody up. By the time we got back outside, everything was on fire," Ryan Sharpe said.
Because of that quick thinking, all eight people and the family’s dogs made it out safely.
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"It’s still really unreal. It hasn’t really set in what’s happened. I spent some time in there trying to gather things, and it’s just not the same," Carter Sharpe told us.
The Red Cross is currently helping the family as they stay with relatives and look for a new temporary home.
The Seminole County Fire Department says the cause of the fire is still under investigation, and the family says they want to rebuild on the same land.
The Source: This story was written based on information shared by the Seminole County Fire Department and Sharpe family.