Anchorage Daily News

Four people were injured, one critically, in a Hillside house fire Wednesday morning. A relative identified the most seriously injured as Duane Triplett, retired president of KIMO Channel 13 and a founder of the Alaska Television Network.

Triplett, his wife Colleen, a retired teacher who last taught at Rabbit Creek Elementary School, their son Travis Triplett and another relative, Robert Ruf, were taken by ambulance to Providence Alaska Medical Center, according to Sara Triplett, Travis' wife and Ruf's mother.

Those injured were suffering from smoke inhalation. Travis Triplett also had cuts from where he broke out windows in an effort to help his parents escape the burning home, Sara Triplett said. A neighbor and two linemen working on a nearby house also helped in the rescue, she said.

Fire investigators determined the fire was electrical and started in a power strip near a Christmas tree, department spokeswoman Jen Collins said.

"A power strip was near the Christmas tree and the lights were actually plugged into it," Collins said. "The power strip malfunctioned in some way and sparked a fire."

The nearby tree fueled the fire and caused it to explode in size, she said. It was unclear if the power strip was overloaded.

About a quarter of the home was destroyed, with most of the rest of it severely damaged by smoke and water, Collins said.

As fire crews mopped up the smoldering home around noon, Triplett and her son's fiancee sat in pajamas in an idling car on the property, staying warm with their rescued pets, Sandy the dog, Stacie the cat and a lizard named Spike. Another dog, a 30-pound Rottweiler mix named Shadow, had fled the burning building and hadn't returned. Two women from the Red Cross brought them snacks and sports drinks.

The site, at 5820 DeArmoun Road at the intersection of Griffin and Birch roads, sits near a ravine with a view of Flattop. It was a relative balmy minus 8 degrees while most of the city was suffering through double-digit negative temperatures.

Sara Triplett said she had just gotten off her job near the airport where she works for a postal contractor and was about to take a nap when she and Travis heard a loud pop from upstairs.

They got up to investigate. Travis opened a door to a staircase leading upstairs and was slammed by a wall of smoke.

Sara Triplett said Travis ran upstairs to find his parents while she called 911.

Anchorage Fire Department spokeswoman Bridget Bushue said the 911 call came in at 10:27 a.m. The first trucks, from the O'Malley Road fire station, arrived at 10:35. Sara Triplett said it felt like five minutes.

Travis busted out a window to get his mother out of the house, helped by the neighbor and the linemen, Sara Triplett said.

Duane Triplett lost consciousness from the smoke and appeared to have been trapped in a back bedroom, police spokeswoman Anita Shell said.

By that time, the first firefighters were arriving and, along with police, they slid the unconscious man out a window using a ladder perched between the window and a nearby hill, Shell said.

Because of the distance between the ladder and the hill, the ladder didn't have a good hold on the window sill, Shell said.

"The ladder actually slipped off of the sill, which meant everybody underneath him close to the house was outstretched with their hands up, holding onto this ladder trying to slide him out of the house on the ladder," she said.

An officer on the scene said he couldn't tell if he was still alive, Shell said.

"There were burns, blisters on this guy already, so he may have been overcome with smoke," Shell said. "That's probably the reason he became unconscious."

By Wednesday evening, officials said he was in "very critical" condition.

It didn't take long for the fire to be brought under control, Sara Triplett said.

Ten people live in the house, including children in school, and two more people were visiting from Colorado, Sara Triplett said. The house was initially constructed in the 1950s, with several additions over the years, she said.

The initial damage estimate was more than $100,000, Bushue said.

Bushue said 18 pieces of firefighting equipment responded to the scene.

Sara Triplett was allowed back into the house around noon to retrieve some belongings. It turned out that as the fire crews fought the blaze upstairs, another team entered her downstairs living area and pushed all her furniture away from the walls. The downstairs crew then covered the furniture, the family's computer and other items with canvas to protect them from water coming through the ceiling from the floor above, saving them additional hardship.

The fire was the eighth major blaze firefighters have had to wrangle since New Year's Day. They handled five more fire calls New Year's Eve.

Cold weather was definitely a contributing factor in the fires, firefighters said. Many fires began in chimneys, with pipe thawing and space heaters responsible for a few blazes as well, Bushue said.

Firefighters were asking residents to be careful in the extreme cold temperatures by using only safety-inspected heat sources. Residents should also ensure their fireplaces are properly maintained and smoke and carbon monoxide detectors are functioning, the department said.

Find Richard Mauer online at adn.com/contact/rmauer or call 257-4345. Find James Halpin online at adn.com/contact/jhalpin or call 257-4589.

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