Naugatuck Youth Honored for Alerting Adults to Bathroom Fire

If it weren’t for an 8-year-old Naugatuck boy’s quick action, a home in Waterbury could have gone up in flames.

Laque Youngblood, a student at Andrew Avenue School, was recognized Friday in the school’s weekly ceremony for alerting his family to a fire in the bathroom of his aunt’s house. Deputy Fire Marshal William Scanlon presented Youngblood with an patch from the Naugatuck Fire Department and a shirt.

“His quick action saved his aunt’s house and saved his family,” Scanlon told a group of grade 4 and 5 students gathered in the school’s gymnasium.

According to a letter to the fire department from Laque’s mother, Lisa Youngblood, the family had gathered at Laque’s aunt’s house in Town Plot on Feb. 6 for a post-Superbowl dinner.

While the adults were in the kitchen the children were playing games in the living room, and suddenly Laque stopped and shouted “there is a flashing bright orange light in the bathroom,” Lisa Youngblood said in the letter.

“He was right,” Lisa Youngblood wrote.

A candle in the bathroom liquefied and caught fire, leaving flames that were 20 inches high. At first, the family tried throwing water on the candle and the container exploded, leaving glass and wax everywhere, the mother wrote. But they were eventually able to put it out with a wet towel.

“All things calmed down,” Lisa Youngblood wrote. “We hugged and thanked Laque for his alertness and savings us all.”