Sheriff honors father, son, for fire response

Sheriff Jon Dearmore has honored a father and son for spotting and responding to the fire that burned two houses on Cape Horn on June 11.

Lorenzo Mendez and his son, Tristan, age 14, were on their way to County Line Park around 5 a.m. when they headed up SR 4 by Cape Horn. They had intended to fish on Sunny Sands but decided at the last minute to go to County Line, so it was by chance they were in the area.

Tristan said he spotted a big orange glow and realized a house was on fire. He yelled, and Lorenzo pulled his vehicle onto the highway shoulder.

While Lorenzo ran to see if people were out of the house, which belonged to Don and Virginia Fullerton, Tristan dialed 9-1-1 to report the fire. The dispatcher on duty was his stepfather, Dave Davis. Tristan told him where the fire was and started relaying information to Davis.

Lorenzo said flames were coming out of the back, or river side of the house, when he ran to the door. He encountered Virginia Fullerton at the door; she tossed a bag to him and he took her up to the highway by Tristan. They told Dave there might be someone inside, and Lorenzo ran back to the basement. He looked in a window and saw no one; ran back and reported that, and ran back and broke the window to call inside. He heard people shouting from below the house, figured everyone was out, and went back to the highway. At this point the house was becoming fully engulfed in flames, and the trees around the house were starting to burn.

"It was hot," said Lorenzo, who has experience fighting wildland fires. "I was wearing rubber boots, and they were hot."

Davis, working alone at 5 a.m., toned out District 4, Cathlamet, Skamokawa and Puget Island fire departments; Cowlitz 2 was later called to assist.

Tristan's call was the second to report the fire. Davis said he earlier received another that said something like, "The house is on fire," before the phone cut out. He had only an address that came with the call, and he was starting to tone out the fire departments when Tristan called.

"It was pretty hairy," Davis said. They tried to determine if someone was still in the house as he monitored the responses of the different departments.

Mike Wright, a lieutenant in the District 4 department, was one of the first firemen on the scene. Fullertons' house was burning, and the fire was starting to spread to a neighboring house owned by Randy and Tracy Zacher.

"The initial dispatch told us there was a possible entrapment," Wright said. "Not knowing what we had to do was pretty scary."

The firemen didn't have a lot of water, for houses in the area use private wells. The firemen concentrated on trying to protect the neighboring house, keeping the fire from spreading to others, and cooling the Fullerton house.

"There were around 50 volunteers from all the departments, and we needed them all," Wright said. "They did an awesome job. We're very fortunate that we didn't have anything more."

Sheriff Dearmore said he wanted to honor Lorenzo and Tristan because they stopped and put themselves at risk to help others.

"You guys are heroes," he said. "You didn't have to stop, but you did. You put yourselves at risk and helped get people out of the burning house.

"Without your efforts, it could have been a lot worse."