Fire gutted a house in Lower Wedgeport Saturday afternoon.
Six children who were in the home got out unharmed with the help of a couple of passing motorists.
The fire started in the upper section of the house and the children inside apparently were unaware there was a fire until they were told by one of those motorists, Alvin Boudreau.
Boudreau was driving by when he saw the upper part of the house on fire and stopped.
“I ran in there, knocking on the door, yelling ‘get out, there’s a fire, get out,’” Boudreau said.
“The kids didn’t know the house was on fire … There was no smell of smoke or anything when I went in.” (The children ranged in age from four to 17, according to the Red Cross.)
Boudreau, a former Wedgeport resident, was on his way back to the Halifax area, where he lives, after attending a family funeral in Wedgeport.
Sharon Southern, a Wedgeport resident, arrived at the fire scene just after Boudreau and helped him get the children out, she said.
A passenger in the vehicle Southern was driving saw smoke coming from the upper part of the house, Southern said.
“I stopped and went to the home and Alvin was already there telling the children to get out,” Southern said.
The children’s mother, Allison Perch, was not at home when the fire broke out. Later, as she watched firefighters battle the blaze, she said her children were alright and that they would find a place to stay.
The fire apparently started in the attic, but she didn't know what could have caused it, she said.
Southern said she was impressed with how the children handled the situation when she and Boudreau were getting them out of the house.
“The children were very brave and very calm,” she said.
