NEW ORLEANS — One woman is dead after her Gentilly home went up in flames Sunday night.
Firefighters arrived at the 2900 block of Serantine Street just after 7 p.m. A 73-year-old woman was trapped inside and died.
Verlie Rodriguez DeCay lives directly behind the home that caught fire and wasn’t aware of the emergency at first.
“My girlfriend and I were sitting at the kitchen table just talking and I went upstairs to look out the window from upstairs I have a balcony out there so from the balcony I could see the smoke coming out of the ceiling,” DeCay said.
DeCay likely wouldn’t have heard much because there were no smoke detectors in the house. Neighbors were alerted to an emergency because they could hear the woman screaming.
Matthew Ballier said the woman is a relative and lives a few houses down. Ballier says he ran to help her.
“She was screaming, I heard her scream my name. I was sitting inside she screamed my name so I came and looked and I saw the side of the house was on fire," Ballier said. "I had to go find my keys and came back and started to throw water but the whole porch was engulfed in flames and she burnt up."
Family members say the woman, who lived alone, hadn’t had any electricity in the house since Hurricane Zeta in 2020. They say she was going back and forth between her house and hotels ever since, working to get the house together.
“Come here check on it, leave come back check on it, leave. She was proud she didn’t want no help,” Ballier said.
Firefighters say they had to force their way into the home as there were burglar bars and chains on the front door. DeCay said she’s been worried something would happen because of the condition of the house.
“There’s no electric no water no nothing and my son has said several times he’s seen someone lighting a candle in there and it’s so close to our house we were concerned,” DeCay said.
Councilman Eugene Green, who represents the district in which the fire occurred, urges everyone who may be living in similar conditions to reach out for help.
“There are resources that can help you not only on a city level but sometimes on a private sector level,” Green said. “Everyone should have a smoke detector that works, everyone should have utilities that work gas and electric don’t use makeshift methods to heat your home. use what’s within city code.”
It took over an hour to get the fire under control. Ballier is now without a loved one and wonders how this could have happened.
“She was a good person, she was chilling by herself she didn’t bother nobody,” Ballier said.
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