Mechanic Helps Put Out Apartment Fire

Ventura firefighters credit a mechanic with helping save an apartment building Wednesday after a resident’s furnace ignited a box of books and sent flames lapping at the walls of her living room.

About noon, Gary Mize, a mechanic for Discount Tire on East Thompson Boulevard, saw smoke billowing from the four-unit building across the street and ran over with a fire extinguisher, prepared to rescue a screaming woman from the blaze.

Mize kicked open the door, knelt below the smoke and turned on the extinguisher.

Ultimately, however, more of the foamy spray hit resident Bonnie Mason than doused the flames.

“She looked like Frosty the Snowman,” Mize, 57, said.

Mason, 56, wasn’t injured by the chemicals but suffered smoke inhalation. She was treated at Community Memorial Hospital and released.

Firefighters put out the fire within minutes without evacuating the building in the 500 block of East Thompson Boulevard.

Considering that Mason’s living room was strewn with paper, Mize may have prevented the whole building from catching fire, Ventura Fire Capt. Dennis Robinson said.

Mason told firefighters that she turned on her heater and then turned her back on the furnace to work on her computer. While she worked, a cardboard box of books next to the furnace caught fire. She tried to douse the flames with water, then gave up and ran outside for help.

The fire caused about $3,500 damage to one wall of the apartment and a couch, Robinson said.