HAMPDEN, Maine — As thick flames quickly consumed Jean Dill’s residence Monday night, neighbors at Hampden Trailer Park on Main Road North ran to her aid.
“I was standing outside having a cigarette and saw the smoke. I yelled, ‘There is a fire,’ and we took off running,” neighbor Jen Lanphear said Tuesday morning of the fire that was reported around 7:30 p.m. the night before.
Nancy McFadden, who is related to Dill by marriage, said her neighbor, a man named Marcus, was the first to arrive.
“He ran down there. She was inside,” McFadden said. “There were flames everywhere.”
The man said Wednesday that Dill had escaped the building when he got there.
Dill, 52, suffered serious burns and was taken by LifeFlight to Maine Medical Center in Portland on Monday night, McFadden said. She was listed in satisfactory condition Tuesday, a hospital spokesman said.
Dill’s kitten died in the fire, which completely destroyed the residence, leaving only the mobile home’s small blackened stove standing. The burned walls of her home Tuesday were in a pile by the road.
“She was cooking something on the stove and decided to go lay down,” Joe Rogers, Hampden Public Safety Director, said Tuesday. “Her smoke detector actually woke her up. Because of that, she made it out.”
The smoke was so thick that Dill could not see but was able to make her way toward her front door, Rogers said.
“She burned her hands when she went to open the door,” he said. “She received burns to her face and hands.”
Unattended cooking on the stove in the kitchen is the official cause of the fire, Sgt. Ken Grimes of the Maine fire marshal’s office said Tuesday.
“I’m just really concerned about Jeannie,” said Bill Cotter, who lives in the mobile home directly behind Dill’s, which Tuesday had burned and melted siding.
He said he saw the flames as he was leaving his house, heading to the store.
“I opened my door and said, ‘Oh my friggin’ Lord.’ The flames were right there,” he said standing at his door, pointing to where Dill’s residence once stood about 10 feet away.
After Dill got out of the burning structure, “her hair was still smoldering,” Lanphear said Tuesday standing in the street near her home. “She was walking toward that puddle. She wanted to put her hair out.”
The neighbors helped Dill to a nearby chair outside and waited for an ambulance to arrive.
U.S. Route 1A was temporarily closed during the fire because the hydrant was located across the road. Firefighters from Bangor, Hermon, Holden, Newburgh and Winterport assisted local crews, Rogers said. The final fire truck returned to its station around 11 p.m., he said.
“She lost everything,” McFadden said, sitting in her car parked near Dill’s flattened and charred trailer. “It’s a miracle that she even got out. I’ve never seen anything go up so fast.”