Smoke!!! - Part 1 of 2

I wrote this post a while ago, but I lost it. I couldn't find it, but I found it the other day and I was super excited! However, it is a pretty long post so I'm breaking it up into two parts. If you don't like that please let me know in a comment below or on Facebook and I'll post the second part before Sunday. 

Before I dive into this tale, please take note that living in SW Virginia, I have two heat sources. One is a heat pump and the second heat source is a wood stove that is in our basement. 

Some days just are not yours. Monday, January 14, 2019 was one of mine.

It started off like most Mondays, with my alarm going off a few more times than I intended. I then got up, did the normal dog and cat checks, letting them in and out, getting the food and water dishes filled up, and filling the whole house humidifier. Once that was completed I settled down to meditate for 20 minutes before I turned on the news hoping work would be delayed for at least an hour or two. After seeing the alphabet run across the bottom of the screen twice and work not listed I knew it was time to get ready to go. I walked downstairs to add another log to the wood stove and to gather up socks and underwear that live in the basket by the dryer. My downfall was the extra stick of wood.

I had I heard Husband add some earlier but wanted to add another one since I didn’t know the Broah’s plan for the day. I put on work gloves, added the log of wood, struggled with closing the door, it keeps not latching, and then shit got weird.

My woodstove itself, sits in my basement, inside a metal shell that helps keep the heat, more together so a little fan can blow the hot air into the main house through a hole in the floor.  A pipe that connects the wood stove to the chimney is L shaped, and a piece just falls right off. Now, that is a big problem. If the smoke isn’t being routed out through the chimney then the only option for it to go it out into the rest of the house. I tried like 3 times to reconnect the pipe to the stove chimney. The problem was the fire was going REALLY good. So all the smoke and fumes are being pushed into that little metal shell. While trying to reconnect this pipe, the issue wasn't the smoke in the lungs as much as straight burning to delivered to my eyes.

Once I realized I wasn’t going to be able to reconnect the pipe I went into Broha’s room and was like hey…hey, hey, but he was snoring away so I was like never mind, I got this. I ran upstairs, covered the vent that leads to the rest of the house from the woodstove box with some towels to try and keep some of the billowing smoke from going upstairs, and then went back to the basement to try and reconnect the pipe again. By this point, fans were set up and blowing, all the doors, and windows that could be opened in the basement were, but the smoke was quickly filling the room. Since I still, no luck reconnecting the pipe I was like I have to get Broha up to see if he could help.

I did get him up and was like the pipe fell off the stove, he being just woken up and the brain wasn’t geared up was like what fell off of what? I was like the pipe that connects the chimney to the stove fell off, I need your help to try and reconnect it. At this point understanding hit his sleepy brain and he was up and coming over to assess the situation. He, like me, tried a few times to connect the pipe without success. I was like we have to just put the fire out. He was like yes, and went to go find a gas mask. I went to find a fire extinguisher.

 With a fire extinguisher in hand, I opened the woodstove door, hit the fire, used the whole tiny thing up and 1 minute later the fire was back to full force. Shit. That was stupid. So now there is smoke, fumes, and chemicals filling the metal shell and the rest of the basement. I went upstairs to grab the other fire extinguishers and realized the entire upper part of the house was now filling with smoke as well. It looked like someone was shooting a street seen in London because the smoke was getting so thick I could not see clearly across the room.

At this point, I have no idea where Broha was and hit straight smoke management. I started by putting Teach outside the on the front porch, opened all the windows I could, and turned on all the fans to hopefully push the smoke outside. I started to open just the kitchen's screen door window and was I didn't have time for that and propped the whole door open. That’s when I proceed to have a Fred Flinstone moment with my cat. Knowing the dog was safely outside the front door, breathing fresh air I decided the cat should do the same thing. I scooped him up, put him out the front door, and then while I checked the other rooms, I saw the cat walk back inside. My first thought was where did you come from? The second thought was like get outside! I scooped up the cat again, put him out the front door, and then worked on getting the fire extinguishers that I was originally upstairs for and saw the cat walk back in through the open kitchen door. Whatever man, it’s your choice to kill yourself.

Now that I was armed with 3 fire extinguishers I walked down into the now super-duper smoke-filled basement. I didn't know where Broha was and I know that I had to put out the fire. That was the only option at this point. When I had tried to put the fire earlier with the fire extinguishers it had not worked because the fire was too hot and had too much wood. I was worried that my 3 remaining fire extinguishers would not have enough power to put out the fire either. My only thought at that point was to remove the wood from the woodstove. And that is exactly exactly what I started to do. We had two bigger leather gloves that looked like gauntlet that both happen to be left hand, yes two gloves both for your left hand, and started pulling out logs from the fire. I then quickly walked outside and threw the logs into the grass. SW Virginia had just had a weird snow/ice storm so the backyard is luckily cold, wet with a snow/slush mixture. This was helpful in keeping the logs from catching things on fire. I was able to remove about two logs without issue but the third log, of course,  it was crumbly and halfway to becoming ash and hits the basement floor. I then get to take a few minutes to stomp out the embers. The last remaining logs were like really, really on fire, so I threw them in the wheelbarrow (the wheelbarrow is used to bring in wood and it happened to still be inside the basement at that time), rolled it outside with the still-burning logs, dumped the whole thing in the yard and just left the wheelbarrow on top of the logs. My hope at the time that it would help smother the logs on fire. 

Now that inside the woodstove is just a bed of red hot angry coals. I take a minute to breathe fresh air and call Husband, who is at work to give him an update, before trying to hit the coals the first of the three extinguishers. It helped, but now the wood smoke is mixed with chemicals that burned the eyes and the lungs. I went back outside, threw the fire extinguishers outside, got some clean breaths of air, hold my breath, and headed back in.

Broha comes back into the fray and had his gas mask on, (don’t ask why he has one, it is just something that is likely to be found in our house), and even though it isn’t rated for smoke, but it was apparently helping with the burning of the eyes. I took the second fire extinguisher and handed Broha the last one. I told him he had to figure out how to get it to work. I hit the fire again with my last extinguisher but it didn't do much as it and craps out halfway through. I guess those things really do expire. As I went back outside to throw the now useless thing outside and get air Broha hits the fire with the last of the extinguishers.

Why did I keep throwing things in my yard? I have no idea but I kept doing it. 

Going back into the basement, the fire inside the wood stove was still not out. All fire extinguishers have been used now what? I was like, well we have a hose right outside, let’s try that. I pull-pushed it threw one of the windows, pulled it over to the stove, turn on the water and nothing came out! It was dripping and not helping put out the file. I could have spit more than what was coming out of the hose. 

What do we do next!?!? How does this riveting story end? You'll find out next Sunday Funday!!!