Woman in Flames During TX Garage Fire

Oct. 02 -- When Stephanie Gamez pulled over to help after spotting a fire on San Antonio's far West Side, she saw a woman trapped inside a garage, blinded by smoke and fire and trying to find her way out.

When she emerged, she was covered in flames, Gamez, 37, said.

"Her eyelids were on fire. Her hair was on fire. Her whole body was on fire," Gamez said with a shudder.

The woman, who has not been identified, was hospitalized Tuesday with severe burns after the fire in the 11000 block of Bald Mountain Drive. Firefighters responded around 8 a.m. for reports of a woman on fire outside the home.

Paramedics got to the scene first and rushed the victim to a Brooke Army Medical Center for treatment. Her current status is unknown.

Gamez was dropping her kids off in the neighborhood when she spotted the fire and heard neighbors screaming for the woman to get out of the garage.

She and another woman pulled over.

"She was bumping against the garage door. She couldn't see," Gamez said. "She was trapped in there."

Though the garage door was closed, the fire, or possibly an explosion, had created an opening through which the woman was able to escape.

The woman then began screaming about demons attacking her.

"It was unreal. I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it. She was just saying the demons were getting her, and she needed them out of her. She wasn't screaming about the fire. She was just saying 'The demons! I need them out of me! I need them out of me!'

"It was crazy," Gamez said.

Ted Cravens, 65, has been the victim's neighbor for more than a decade. He said she was trying the sell the house and had recently found some buyers. Craven said the two weren't close and the woman largely kept to herself.

Rudy Khalaf, division chief for the Bexar County Fire Department, said the garage was fully engulfed in flames when firefighters arrived, but they were able to extinguish it before it spread to the rest of the house, which was vacant but still hooked up to utilities.

The Bexar County Fire Marshall's Office is now investigating the blaze.

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