Child’s Warning Saves Family From Blaze

“Every cloud has a silver lining,” Helen Rowland said as she surveyed the burned ruins of her neighbors’ house on Mildred Avenue in Garden Grove Tuesday. “His car may have burned but, thank God, they got those three little babies out unharmed.”

Rowland was talking about Janet and Edward Arendt III and their three daughters, year-old twins Melissa and Malinda and Candice, 3. The young family’s brand new Corvette was destroyed by the fire that whipped through their home Tuesday morning.

Mother Yelled ‘Fire’

A Fire Department spokeswoman, Ellen Covey, said the family apparently was sleeping when Candice woke up and alerted her mother by yelling “Fire!” Janet Arendt, 29, then woke the rest of her family, and they escaped unharmed.

By the time firefighters arrived, the house was ablaze, Covey said. She said the alarm was received at 9:11 a.m., but the flames weren’t contained until 9:50.

The fire apparently started in the den, Covey said. “The garage and den were fully involved and the fire was spreading into the living room and kitchen when firefighters arrived,” she said.

Smoke and heat damage was extensive throughout the house, Covey said.

Fire Department officials estimated damage to the house at $49,000, with another $90,000 loss to the contents. The cause of the fire was under investigation.

Harry Huggins, a spokesman for the American Red Cross, said the Arendts have been taken in by family members and neighbors.

He said the Red Cross still will offer its services to the family.

“We want to be sure that they’re not going along in life more miserable than they need be,” Huggins said.