DETROIT --
A 100-year-old woman has lived through the Great Depression, the invention of the television and now a fire that destroyed her home.
A quick-thinking neighbor and firefighters saved 100-year-old Suzie Jordan, her daughter and her grandson from a fire that tore through their home Monday morning.
The fire broke out on the main floor on the family's home of 30 years on Detroit's eastside on Phillip Street near Warren Avenue.
A neighbor alerted the family to the fire and broke a window to gain entrance.
"The next thing I know I heard my grandmother screaming," said fire victim Dominic Stewart.
When the smoke filled the second-story bedroom where Jordan and her great-grandson, Stewart, were sleeping, Stewart was able to jump out of the window onto a mattress neighbors had put out.
"Basically I tried to do everything to help her get out. I picked her up and tried to get her over to the window but she didn't want to go," said Stewart.
Jordan, who celebrated her centennial birthday in August, could not see through the smoke and was not able to jump from the window.
When firefighters arrived, firefighter Patrick Burt climbed a ladder outside the bedroom window, picked up the 5-foot woman and handed her to two other firefighters waiting on a second ladder.
Firefighter Jason Francis jokingly said Burt had asked Jordan if she was standing up because she was so short.
"She kept saying, 'I am doing the best I can, baby,'" said Francis.
Jordan was moved to Detroit Receiving Hospital, where she is being treated for smoke inhalation. The other two victims were not injured.
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About the Author
Billy Goldfeder
BILLY GOLDFEDER, EFO, who is a Firehouse contributing editor, has been a firefighter since 1973 and a chief officer since 1982. He is deputy fire chief of the Loveland-Symmes Fire Department in Ohio, which is an ISO Class 1, CPSE and CAAS-accredited department. Goldfeder has served on numerous NFPA and International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC) committees. He is on the board of directors of the IAFC Safety, Health and Survival Section and the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation.