A Waltham man who collapsed after saving his wife from their burning vacation home in New Hampshire early yesterday would likely have perished if not for the thermal-imaging camera that enabled volunteer firefighters to locate him, authorities said.
"It was extremely smoky. There was zero visibility," said Deputy Chief Scott Taylor of the Sanbornton Fire Department in central New Hampshire's Lakes Region.
"The fire was contained to a room on the first floor," Taylor said, "however, he was found at the top of the stairs, unresponsive."
Despite his brush with death, Robert Livoti, 65, was treated at Franklin Regional Hospital and released.
The fire, Taylor said, is believed to have started some time before 6:30 a.m. as Robert and slept in their second-floor bedroom on Hueber Drive. The suspected cause is an electrical cord crushed under the weight of firewood that overheated, igniting the tinder. The blaze spread to furniture, then a wall, then the ceiling.
Taylor said Robert shepherded Betty Ann Livoti, 63, out on a second-story porch, where she somehow managed to get down and run to a neighbor's house for help.
A dozen volunteer firefighters from Sanbornton - a town of fewer than 3,000 residents near Hermit Lake - and neighboring New Hampton clambered out of their own beds to rush to the cottage.
"They had an extension cord running across the floor," Taylor said. "They had wood for a wood stove stacked on top of it. The cord overheated and caused the wood to catch fire."
After knocking down the flames on the first floor, firefighters used a thermal-imaging camera - a device that can pick up the outline of a body when otherwise not visible to the naked eye by honing in on its heat.
Robert Livoti wasn't breathing when he was carried outside and had to be resuscitated. Damages to the property were estimated at $40,000.
Republished with permission from the Boston Herald
