Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, April 13, 1995                   TAG: 9504130044
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: KIMBERLY N. MARTIN
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

WOMAN NARROWLY ESCAPES BLAZE

A smoke detector alerted Turner to a blaze that had started in the living room of her Camelot Village townhouse, said Lt. Dave Kaylor of the Salem Fire Department.

Turner immediately phoned the Fire Department for help. Firefighters received the call at 8:53 a.m. Less than 10 minutes after firefighters arrived on the scene, they had tamed the flames, Kaylor said.

Turner was rescued by ladder through a window in the townhouse's upper level.

Firefighters blamed the blaze on a discarded cigarette, which fell from an ashtray onto papers on the living-room floor.

That kind of accident "is fairly common among smokers. You think it's in the ashtray properly, and you walk away and it falls out," Kaylor said.

Turner, who was treated at the scene for smoke inhalation, declined to go to the hospital.

Kaylor put the loss at about $5,000 in smoke and fire damage. Because of the structural damage, the townhouse is unfit for the Turners to stay in, Kaylor said. Instead Turner and her family are staying with Salem relatives.