By:Walter Weltner
The alarm was telephoned to the Fire Communications Bureau at 4:05 a.m. by a Valley Stream code enforcement officer, who, while on routine patrol, was alerted to the blaze by a passerby. Valley Stream firefighters responded in minutes, and while conducting a search of the home located the victim-s body on the first floor. Efforts to revive her failed, and she was pronounced dead at Franklin Hospital Medical Center at approximately 5 a.m.
The victim was identified as Alice Toal. Her family could not be reached for comment.
Firefighters extinguished the fire, which started on the first floor of the two-story house, within 45 minutes. No other injuries were reported. Mutual aid was requested from the Elmont, Hewlett, Woodmere and Lawrence-Cedarhurst fire departments.
Valley Stream Fire Department Chief Robert Petry, the incident commander at the scene, pointed out that this was the second serious house fire in Valley Stream in the past week in which smoke detectors were not present or were inoperative. Had smoke detectors been functioning at these fires, he said, damage to the homes would have been minimal and a life could have been saved. We have made great strides in educating people of the importance of smoke and carbon monoxide detectors being installed in their homes, but unfortunately there are still people out there that don-t get the message and pay with their lives.
On March 19, a North Terrace Place home went up in flames, displacing a family and killing two family cats. That blaze was attributed to a portable electric heater either the heater was too close to surrounding surfaces or the extension cord used to power the device was not the proper size.
The cause of the March 25 fire is undetermined, but is not considered suspicious. Upon inspection, firefighters discovered that both the power lines and gas lines that feed the house were disconnected.
