On Oct. 17, a Sunday, David Thatch was settling in with his son to watch the Redskins game. During the pregame show, 8-year-old Mitchell went outside and saw, to his surprise, black smoke pouring from the garage.
Thatch ran out after his son — and his first thought at seeing the smoke was that he could put out the fire. He got a bucket of water.
"That's when you realize water is slow," Thatch said a month later as he sat in a rental home just blocks from where the gutted remains of his family's home stands in Farmwell Hunt. Thankfully, no one was hurt in the fire, but the family lost just about everything — clothes, cars, toys, pictures, Thatch's wife's handmade, traditional Vietnamese wedding dress.
The cause of the fire? A refrigerator in the garage.
AS THATCH and his family gathered across the street from the blaze that Sunday afternoon, the neighbors started appearing.
"It was amazing," said Thatch, who is the vice president of finance for Metters Industries in Tysons Corner. "People were hurrying from everywhere, screaming, hollering, 'Is anyone inside?'"
Once people knew the family was safe, thoughts turned to something else: food and water started materializing from nearby homes. Thatch was being treated for smoke inhalation and was still in his shorts and T-shirt; a neighbor gave him a coat.
Hours later, when the fire was finally extinguished, the fire marshal let the Thatches back inside to gather what valuables they could find. What they saw was a house in ruins — charred furniture, burned carpet. Outside, however, people were already in action. A neighbor lent his basement for a space for the Thatches to gather and eat. Another neighbor knew of a nearby house for rent where they could stay. And Paul Vickers, the principal of Mill Run Elementary School, where Mitchell and Matthew go, had stopped by earlier in the afternoon and was preparing to mobilize school parents to help out the Thatch family.
Vickers sent out a letter to parents explaining the situation, and the response was enormous — more than $8,000 in cash and gift certificates was gathered in just the first three days, and donations are still coming in. One donation was in an envelope scrawled with a child's pencil and containing $4.18.
"It's not hard to project yourself into this situation," Vickers said.
"This is the first real tragedy that people have been aware of," said GiGi St. Clair, Farmwell Hunt's Homeowners Association president, as she reflected on the community's automatic focus on helping the family. As a 35-home subdivision, Farmwell Hunt is among Ashburn's smaller communities. Before the Thatch house burned, its collective mettle, so to speak, had not been tested.
Anonymous neighbors dropped bags of clothes on the Thatch's driveway the night after the fire. And others have organized to provide them with a home-cooked meal every night since moving to their temporary home — an especially helpful amenity, since the Thatches are too spooked to use electrical appliances in their new home and unplug everything when they leave.
IT REMAINS to be seen if GM, the maker of the refrigerator, will take responsibility for the fire's estimated $500,000 in damages. Repair on the house will take approximately a year.
Until then, Thatch is still counting his blessings. He and his wife are both Vietnamese immigrants and know something about starting from nothing. Still, he knows how tough the move and loss has been on his two sons.
"I just need my kids to have a normal day from now on," Thatch said.
The Thatch family's gratitude toward the community is genuine. Thatch continually alludes to people — friends and strangers alike — he's thankful for.
"The thing that is still amazing up to now is how the school, the community, the workplace .... you can't find a word for it," Thatch said. "It's like a movie story."