Smoke!

I went down to check my mailbox today and noticed a rather thick cloud of smoke at the end of one of the hallways in our building down on the first floor. I didn't really know what to make of it, especially noting the seeming lack of concern from the other few residents who wandered by. Had someone just burned a pizza or something? How could that have gotten so thick?

Just then one of the apartment managers wandered by with a couple other people, probably a couple prospective residents being shown the units. I pointed the smoke out to the manager, and she told me to call the police and she hurried back to the main office to report what was happening. I ran back to my apartment (not sure why I didn't just use my cell phone) on the third floor using the stairs, the way you are always taught to when there is a fire in the building. Called 911 and told them it, they sent out a fire truck and told me to pull the fire alarm and get out of the building.

I had never pulled a fire alarm before. We used to have all kind of false alarms in high school and were told how much trouble those people got in for doing it, so I guess it has been ingrained into me NEVER to pull a fire alarm. I met some people on my floor about to go down by the elevator and I told them what was going on. We went down together to the first floor again and the smoke had spread throughout the floor, though not terribly thick. I wanted witnesses I pulled that alarm, I didn't want to get in trouble (though I had always wondered what it felt like to pull one of those things. Now I know.).

I pulled the alarm just by the front door as the first police officer (or maybe she was a fire marshall, I missed the patch on her uniform) was coming in and I told her about it. Slowly other residents started exiting the building too.

It turned out to be a non-issue. Another resident came forward, apparently the smoke had come from his unit and it was in fact just smoke. They let us back in after about 15 minutes.

This would be a pretty much a non-event if it weren't for the fact that our building had had an actual major fire about 2 months ago in which 6 units were completely destroyed and another 10 damaged from smoke and water. I think what I find most disturbing was the lack of concern from other residents about it. I know I wasn't the first to see the smoke (a pizza delivery man was just coming out of that hallway when I pulled the alarm). I'm just as guilty here. I had to be told to call 911 before I did it. Why wasn't that my first reaction?

Maybe it's that old notion of the disbursal of responsibility. I think my first reaction was that if there were really a problem, someone else would have already called the fire department. Right? Therefore, it must not be a real problem. I can let someone else take care of it.

This is a problem.

In any case, nothing left to see here. Crisis averted. Other than a bad smell down on the first floor, it looks like there's no problem. Except my friends who have been jokingly telling me I should buy a house, listing the lack of fires as a chief reason after the big fire a couple months ago. Maybe they are right?