[W]hen William Mayo ran into a burning house in Franklin Wednesday morning, he had just one thought — “we have to get them out of here.”
Two of his neighbors, Diana Pilon and her husband Terry, an amputee, were stuck inside their house as it burned around them. Mayo and two others ran into the house to get the couple out. Just as they escaped the building, a “backdraft” blew out the windows and set the house totally ablaze.
Police reported it was only a matter of seconds before the house was engulfed. Mayo estimated if they’d taken 15 seconds longer, every one of them would be dead.
“It had to be a miracle,” he said.
Wednesday morning was a typical one for Mayo up to that point. He was opening the Franklin General Store, which he owns, and had driven across town to pick something up.
But on his way back, a little after 9 a.m., he saw Diana Pilon on her porch, while smoke billowed from the side of the house.
“She was just sobbing, totally petrified,” Mayo said. “It was like a catatonic state. She couldn’t move.”
The Pilons are regular customers for Mayo, so he knew that Terry Pilon’s leg had been amputated a few years ago after he was hit by a drunk driver on his motorcycle, and he would probably have a hard time getting out of the house. Mayo also knew there was no way he could drag him out on his own.
Because of the poor cellphone service in Franklin, Mayo sped to the telephone center, and asked them to call 911.
Then he went to the General Store, where he saw two men in their truck taking out the garbage. He yelled out to them, “Help, quick, quick we gotta save this guy, we don’t have any time,” Mayo recalled.
Mayo and the two men, Scott Ovitt, 42, and Charles McAllister, 56, both of Richford, took off as fast as they could toward the house.
The two others were faster, and were able to get inside before Mayo. When he ran through the door, the smoke was too thick to see more than a few feet, but he eventually saw Ovitt and McAllister dragging Pilon around a corner. But by then, some of the windows were already starting to break, and he knew they had to get out, fast.
“It almost simulates an explosion,” Mayo said. “It’s like a blow torch, heat just comes pouring out.”
Mayo climbed over the porch railing and waited on the ground to catch Pilon, while Ovitt and McAllister hoisted him over to safety.
“After that, I just broke down,” he said. “I cried for an hour.”
All three of them escaped with no injuries, save some singed hair. They were taken into ambulances for oxygen because of the smoke they inhaled, and Mayo said his voice has been a little raspy since.
Authorities examined the scene and determined the fire originated in the garage near an electrical outlet, but due to “severe devastation and consumption from the fire, the actual cause is undetermined,” according to the Franklin Fire Department. The fire is “not considered suspicious at all.”
Mayo said at that time of day, there are not very many cars out on the road in Franklin. Normally, he said, no one would have ever noticed Diana Pilon on her porch. And even if they did, there wouldn’t usually be people around who were young and healthy enough to help with the rescue.
“Those two guys, I call them angels,” he said.
At the General Store, they put up a donation jar for the Pilons, to try and help recover what they lost in the fire.
“Franklin is one of the best, most generous communities I’ve ever seen,” Mayo said. “People will help out.”
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly attributed the fire assessment to the Richford Fire Department based on an error in a press release from the Vermont State Police.
