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CHAMPAIGN COUNTY, Ill. (WCIA) – To lose your house and everything in it is a terrifying thought. To watch it burn for an hour is unimaginable, but it happened to one family in Somer Township Tuesday night.
“I went to bed and then I heard my husband making a bunch of noise in the living room and he comes in the bedroom and says, ‘something’s going on,’” Toni Hernandez said Wednesday.
Hernandez woke up to a nightmare.
“So I jumped out of bed, and we both came out. I saw smoke going in the air conditioner,” she said.
The fire started on her porch.
“Within minutes, it was growing very rapidly,” Thomasboro Fire Chief Paul Cundiff said.
While on scene, Cundiff said it was one of the largest fires his crews have handled lately – taking about an hour to extinguish.
“When first units arrived, the entire house was involved, into the garage. There was an addition onto the garage that was also burning,” Cundiff said.
“I guess we’re just going to have to start over,” Hernandez said.
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But she doesn’t know where to begin.
“I’ve called everywhere to help,” she said.
Hernandez says the hardest part was decades of memories going up in flames.
“We had photos of his siblings and his dad that had all passed away already. And my kids when they were little. Can’t bring any of that back,” she said.
They’re a tight knit family who says while they’re lucky to be alive, each one lost a piece of themselves in that fire.
“My oldest son literally moved out three days ago. He only took a few of his clothes with him, but he brought them back yesterday to wash them,” Hernandez said. “So he’s just like the rest of us, he only has the clothes on his back.”
Now, all there’s left to do is comb through the rubble, hoping to find anything they can carry into their new reality to remember the old one by.
“My husband did find a baby book that had pictures in it of my oldest son. The pictures were charred but you could still kind of see them. That’s something I guess we can keep,” Hernandez said.
The State Fire Marshal is investigating the cause of Tuesday night’s fire. One relative is raising money to help the Hernandez family find a new place to live. If you’d like to pitch in, you can find the online fundraiser here.
