Around 60 volunteers from the volunteer fire brigade are deployed to prevent the flames from spreading to other apartments and houses in the core city of the fire in the apartment building. They succeed in teamwork.
It’s like a nightmare for the affected family. “From one minute to the next, we lost everything. Not even the family pictures and the most important documents have remained with us. The fire and the heavy smoke development destroyed everything. It happened so quickly, ”said 28-year-old Luisa Arena at a meeting with this newspaper in April. How are the young parents and their son doing today, at the end of the Corona year?
The WESTFALEN-BLATT met the three Höxteraner again and talked to them about the past months and their future.
Enrico, now three years old, is holding a small children’s camera and is busy taking pictures of the newspaper reporter and the other guests who have a surprise in store.
Enrico laughs a lot and is very happy. His parents, Marcel Fischer (33) and Luisa Arena, are also happy for him, can laugh again after all the hardships and look ahead. The world now looks more colorful, happier and more optimistic than on that bitter day when the fire caused high damage to the building (an initial estimate was around 250,000 euros) and completely shook the family’s life.
Return to the apartment
There is more positive news at the end of 2020: The three can now live in their old apartment again, which has been extensively renovated and partly redesigned. “We now also have a covered terrace. Our landlady is also happy that we are back. Because before the fire, we lived here for just eight months. We liked the apartment straight away and also the neighborhood. ”The couple had been looking for this perfect apartment for a year and a half.
The landlord’s insurance bore the damage to the building. But their own damage, that’s why they’re still wrestling with their insurance. A court hearing (the third) is planned for January. The family lost all their household items in March: furniture, electrical appliances such as television and radio, clothing for their son and parents, and much more. Everything burned and ended up in the disposal.
“Nothing could be used any more. The data in the computer is also gone forever. But we were all able to save ourselves without injuries, that’s what counts in the end. The following months we stayed with our families. They were a great support ”, says Marcel Fischer, who, like his partner, had to reapply and obtain all ID cards and papers that everyone needs for everyday life.
Lots of support
The trained drywall builder, who last worked as a bricklayer and is currently looking for a new job after the winter season, and the trained beautician who currently has a permanent position in a nursing service – they master all challenges.
“What meant a lot to us during the difficult times was the great support from Uwe Hütte from Höxter over the past few months. He kept asking questions and offering help, ”says Arena, praising her very personal“ hero ”. Unterbrandmeister Uwe Hütte (he is a member of the Höxter fire brigade) started an aid campaign immediately after the fire – and, together with other helpers, collected donations in kind from people throughout the region who wanted to support the family in need.
Donation
There were also money donations again and again – as now at the end of the year from the couple Torsten and Melanie Reitmeier. You have been running the “Zum Schnitzelkönig Höxter” restaurant in the city center since January 2020 and have given the family 500 euros. “You lost everything in one fell swoop. You have to help ”, says Reitmeier.
The great wave of willingness to help gave the couple and child courage and new hope from the start, they find out in retrospect. “There were many beautiful gestures that touched us. So people brought toys for Enrico that we didn’t even know. ”
And they think of the family of nine who recently lost everything in Beverungen, also due to a fire. Arena: “I would like to tell you that things are going up again and that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. We thank everyone for their help! ”
–
