Open your hearts, wallets to help fire victims’ family

Shock, heartache and anguish continue to rip at the heart of the city of Youngstown and the entire Mahoning Valley as funeral planning begins for the five young children who perished late Sunday in one of the most deadly house fires in the history of the city.

We, too, mourn the loss of five precious lives with so much potential – Aleysha Rosario, 9; Charles Gunn, 3; Ly’Asia Gunn, 2; and twins Brianna Negron and Arianna Negron, both only 1 year old. All of them died in the fire at their two-story single-family home in the Newport neighborhood of Youngstown’s South Side about 11:30 p.m. Sunday.

We also extend our condolences to America “Amy” Negron Acevedo, who on Tuesday remained in critical condition in Cleveland’s MetroHealth hospital and hope she will make a strong physical recovery from the serious injuries she sustained in the fire.

FIRE CASTS PALL OVER HOLIDAY

By all accounts, America has been a loving, responsible and hard-working parent for her children. And friends and family members remember her children as bright, amazing, energetic, sweet, beautiful and well-behaved.

Clearly, the Parkcliffe Avenue inferno has cast a pall over the Christmas season of joy for family members and friends of the victim. It also serves as a reminder for the larger community that senseless tragedies know no holidays.

The fatal blaze also should unite the community to do everything possible to lessen its painful fallout. In the short term, that means rallying around surviving family members and friends of the victims at this unfortunate time by making a donation to a fund set up to help defray funeral costs for the children. Contributions may be made to a Go Fund Me account at www.gofundme.com/6jgrkgg. More than $6,000 had been raised as of Tuesday night.

Also, make plans now to support a fundraiser pasta dinner for the children that will take place next Tuesday from 4 to 8 p.m. at Flambeau’s Live restaurant at 2308 Market St.

As for the long term, the calamity calls for all in the Valley to take proactive measures in memory of the children to ensure such a tragedy never recurs. Toward that end, individuals and families must make home-fire prevention priority No.1 today and every day.

PROFESSIONAL RESPONSE

To be sure, Youngstown firefighters deserve our community’s gratitude for their speedy, professional response to the blaze. According to reports, firetrucks were on the scene within 2 minutes of the 911 call. Two firefighters suffered injuries in the blaze and many others likely will endure lingering emotional distress over their inability to save the innocent children’s lives. The department brass and our entire community owe them our complete appreciation and support.

The deadly fire that lit up the night sky is particularly heart-rending and frustrating because, according to early reports, the home was equipped with functioning smoke detectors that firefighters noted had indeed activated before their arrival.

Although the fatalities in this fire should not be regarded as an indictment against smoke detectors, they are not or never have been failsafe. After all, about 40 percent of all deaths from fires in the U.S. occur in homes with fully functional smoke detectors, according to studies by the National Fire Protection Association.

Those same studies, however, also show that the death rate per 100 reported home fires was more than twice as high in homes that did not have any working smoke alarms compared to the rate in homes with working smoke detectors.

The association also strongly encourages homeowners to install hard-wired smoke detectors over battery-operated versions as they are much more effective in preventing death, injury and property loss in fires.

Homeowners should also ensure all members of the household are trained in an emergency evacuation route and know basic fire prevention strategies.

That knowledge is particularly critical in December, the leading month for deadly house fires in the United States, according to the NFPA. Space heaters, Christmas lights and candles all must be handled with extreme care as they are responsible for more than their fair share of destructive blazes during this final month of the year.

To be sure, understanding the stark toll that house fires of all causes exact – 3,515 deaths in the U.S. in 2016 – and taking simple ongoing safety precautions would be fitting ways to memorialize the grievous losses of Aleysha, Charles, Ly’Asia, Brianna and Arianna.

By doing so, we as a community can learn from this tragedy and collectively vow that it will never, ever happen again.