Family grateful after escaping fire

A Gardnerville family hurt by the economic recession is counting their blessings after they escaped unharmed from a fire that ravaged the garage and roof of their Ruhenstroth home early Wednesday.

"I'm pretty shocked still," Kimbre Plante said Wednesday morning. "All this stuff is gone. But I'm going through that 'I'm alive' thing."

Plante and her husband Dell woke up around midnight Tuesday after smelling smoke and hearing strange noises.

"I thought my wife was rummaging through something in the garage," Dell said. "I yelled for her to be quiet. I said it again louder, then heard her reply, which was coming from the wrong end of the house. Just a few seconds after that, the smoke alarm went off."

The couple and their 8-year-old daughter Zayza got out of the house. Firefighters rescued one of the family dogs and their cat. A second dog got out OK.

Hit hard by the recession, the Plante family already has had a tumultuous year.

"Dell lost his construction job because of the economy," Kimbre said. "We lost our house to foreclosure, and rented this house the first of January."

The family now is staying with Dell's mother, who lives in the Pine Nuts.

"We do have a roof over our heads and we do have food," Kimbre said.

East Fork Fire & Paramedics Districts Investigator Terry Taylor estimated total damage of $150,000. He said the cause of the fire is still under investigation, but believes it originated in the garage.

"It's a tearjerker," he said. "I told the family that their luck had changed. They're alive. The ceiling could have come down and that would have been the end of it."

Although they have shelter, the Plante family is still in need of basic items: hay for their goats, dog and cat food, and clothes and bedding for Zayza, as many of her belongings were ruined by the smoke.

Donations can be dropped off at Shirley Valley Grooming, 1408 Industrial Way, Gardnerville, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday-Friday and 8 a.m. to noon on Saturday.

Monetary donations can be made to the Plante Donation Fund, US Bank account

# 153752825882.