May 17--A 63-year-old woman was killed and her daughter was hospitalized following a fire Friday night in their home in northwest suburban Palatine.
Lois Demos, 63, was pronounced dead at 9:08 p.m. at Northwest Community Hospital in Arlington Heights following the fire in the 100 block of South Street Friday night, according to the Cook County medical examiner's office.
Crews responded to a call of a house fire at the South Street home about 8:15 p.m., and arrived approximately four minutes after the call, said Palatine Deputy Chief William Gabrenya.
When firefighters arrived, they discovered smoke coming from the roof and second-floor windows of the two-story home. Neighbors had immediately alerted firefighters that people were trapped inside the home, so firefighters entered the home and found two women on the second floor.
Demos was found unconscious near a bedroom of the home and the woman's daughter, who officials said was about 20 years old, was found "semi-conscious" near the living room.
Both women were rescued and taken to Northwest Community Hospital.
The woman's daughter, who neighbors say is disabled, was later transferred to Loyola University Medical Center to be treated for burns, fire officials said. The mother was the daughter's primary caregiver, neighbors said.
At the Demos family's home Saturday morning, the air smelled of rain and the block was quiet, with the occasional thump from fire officials removing debris. Neighbors stood at a line of yellow tape, staring tearfully at the hollow and crumbling house. Its second-floor windows were broken and the the window frames charred and blackened.
On the left side of the home's lawn lay several flower bouquets in Demos' memory. On the right side lay a 4-foot pile of the family's ruined belongings: Clothing, sheets, blankets and a tattered teddy bear dressed in a Santa costume.
"It's amazing, you would typically think that this would happen in the middle of the night, when people are sleeping," Gabrenya said. "But to have it happen at 8 o'clock, and have fire crews here in four minutes which is a very fast response time, and still have a fatality is just remarkable in the sense that that's how deadly fire and smoke could be."
For the handful of neighbors who jumped to the rescue upon seeing the smoke, and who tried to enter the building and save its inhabitants, the smoke proved too challenging. Two neighbors who tried to save the women before fire crews arrived were hospitalizedat St. Alexis Medical Center, where their conditions had been stabilized.
Bryan Urban, who was visiting his parents at his childhood home a few doors down from the Demos' home, sat on the back porch with his father and daughter, Lydiah, when she noticed the smoke. She immediately called 911 as the family ran over, he said.
Urban recalled seeing a neighbor with a severely cut leg, and believes the neighbor may have tried to kick in the window. A woman with him removed her shirt to contain the bleeding wound as flames lept and people screamed, he said.
"It's surreal," he said. "Because you just stop and you try to assess the situation but you just don't understand what's happening."
Urban and another neighbor tried to pry open the door but when it opened, were knocked back by the heavy smoke. He said the smoke was "dark and miserable," and that it immediately attacked his lungs.
He recalled a younger man showing up, and while Urban gave the man his shirt to help him breathe through the smoke, he was also unable to go in.
"It was just black, the whole hallway," he said. "I could see the gate behind me but that was it. I've had smoke inhalation before this but understand now why people say don't rush into smoking buildings. It immediately affects you. It immediately takes you out."
Gabrenya, who commended neighbors' efforts to rescue the family, said crews were able to bring the blaze under control about 15 minutes after they arrived.
The house was heavily damaged and deemed uninhabitable, fire officials said. Crews plan to board up the house and Gabrenya said he believes Demos' son will contact the insurance company.
The cause of the fire was not known as of Saturday afternoon, as fire officials continued to gather evidence and take photographs. The fire is being investigated by the Palatine Fire Department, the Palatine Police Department and the Illinois State Fire Marshall's office.
