STOUGHTON, Mass. --
A Stoughton family is thanking their 7-year-old daughter for saving their lives after a fire broke out in their attic while they were watching television and they didn't know it.
Fire officials said Kiana Mills was in her Corbett Road bedroom about 10:15 p.m. on Jan. 11 when she smelled smoke and ran to alert her parents.
Initially they didn't believe her because the smoke alarms had not gone off, but Kiana persisted and finally her parents went to check her room, the Patriot Ledger reported.
They heard crackling and smelled smoke and when Kiana's dad opened the attic door, he could see smoke.
The entire family, including Kiana's mother, father, brother and grandmother, scrambled out of the house and by the time fire crews arrived the fire was blazing through the attic.
The smoke alarms hadn't detected the blaze because the fire was above the sensor zone, the paper reported.
Kiana's mother Cheryl said fire officials told her if the fire had broken out while they were asleep, the ceiling could have caved in on them.
The second-grader was recognized by the Stoughton Fire Department at her school with a certificate, baseball cap and jacket. When the weather improves, she and some of her friends will get a ride to school on a fire truck.
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