Delivery driver saves the day

By DEVIN HEILMAN

Staff Writer

Call it heroism, call it firefighter instinct or call it downright being a good person — Randy Fodrey will say he was just doing what needed to be done.

"It’s just something that needs to be done by everybody," said Fodrey, of Athol. "I’m not being a hero or anything else. I saw a problem and helped with it."

The Schwan's Home Service delivery driver didn't think twice about calling 911 and jumping out of his truck to extinguish what could have been a gnarly house fire along his route April 6.

"I saw the smoke coming out of the house and I’m going, ‘That just doesn’t look right, it’s the wrong color to be just a fireplace burning,’” said Fodrey, who has a keen fire sense thanks to the 10 years he spent as a volunteer firefighter with the California Department of Forestry.

Fodrey didn't see any visible fire on the front of Rick Hodges' north Hayden home, so he walked around to the back.

"That’s when I saw the flame,” Fodrey said. "I walked around the property and there was no hose, so I actually broke into his garage and found a hose and was applying water when the fire department actually got there."

Because of Fodrey's fast-thinking fire-quelling action, Hodges' home was saved.

"We don’t want any citizen to put themselves in danger, but the fact that Randy assessed the situation and jumped on it so quickly truly made the difference," said Jim Lyon, deputy fire marshal and spokesman for Northern Lakes Fire Protection District. "We certainly would have been there fairly shortly, but by that time it could have been in the attic and it would have been a whole different ball game. Randy kept it from being tragic."

Hodges, who stepped out to get a haircut that day and was gone for less than an hour, said his house would have been destroyed if not for Fodrey.

Instead of costing $225,000 and causing the loss of irreplaceable items, the havoc wreaked by the wood stove chimney fire was cosmetic and only cost about $525 to fix.

"I’m usually home all day. I saw all the fire trucks coming this way when I was heading into town and I thought, 'What the heck?'" Hodges said. "If he wouldn't have stopped it, it would have burned the house down. There's more people needed in the world like him."

Northern Lakes Fire honored Fodrey with a Meritorious Citizen Recognition award during a surprise ceremony Tuesday afternoon. His wife, Francine, daughter Heather Strickland, and rosy-cheeked 7-month-old granddaughter, Blakely, were proud to attend.

"I think it’s great. I’m not surprised. I’ve known him to do that my whole life,” Heather said. "This is what he does. He sees a problem, he sees someone that needs help, and he jumps.”

Francine said that's just what her husband does.

"He stops at car crashes, he stops at everything," she said. "He’s never put out a fire, but he scared me to death one time and jumped into a van that flipped over. The rear end was smoky and I’m sitting going, ‘Oh God, don’t catch on fire, don’t catch on fire,’ but he didn’t even care, he just jumped in and got the people out. He just does that, and he doesn’t think he’s a hero."