A Blaze!

Thick, acrid smoke was filling the hallway. Dave Crocker spotted the source instantly—apartment 321.The family with the Australian shepherd.

- Michael Welzenbach 

THE NIGHT OF SUNDAY, January 19, 1997, was quiet in the sprawling apartment complex at 7 Jamieson Street in Dartmouth, N.S., a stone’s throw from Halifax Harbour. Outside it was bitterly cold and snowy. In apartment 324, after cooking himself a simple hamburger supper, 46-year-old Dave Crocker turned on the television to keep his mind off pressing problems.

It hadn’t been a good few months for the stocky, unemployed firefighter. After 22 years of faithful service with the Department of National Defence (DND), Crocker had been laid off in 1996 with a year’s salary and severance pay. He had searched for fire-related work as far afield as Ottawa, without success.

With child-support payments for his two sons to worry about, his severance couldn’t be stretched much further. To make ends meet, he’d had to borrow money from his elderly parents, and that hurt his pride.

At about 1 a.m., Crocker went to bed. An optimist, he told himself things would look better in the morning. With his qualifications, a job was bound to turn up, even if it meant leaving Nova Scotia.

Across the hall in apartment 321, Wayne Wells had long been in bed. He had to leave for work at 6 a.m., and before that he generally took Bear, the family’s beloved Australian shepherd, for a walk. His wife, Debra,42, turned in shortly after midnight, reminding her 17-year-old daughter not to stay up too late. Hazel-eyed Jamie was babysitting her cousin, Donald Joseph, or DJ, as he was often called. But the two-and-a-half-year-old was restive, and it took another couple of hours before she was able to lull him to sleep in her bed.

CROCKER AWOKE AROUND 7:30 the next morning and prepared a leisurely breakfast. Less than two hours later, at around 9:20, he smelled something peculiar. Glancing at his front door, he noticed smoke snaking around the edges of the frame.