ALICE, Texas — What was supposed to be a vibrant night filled with gratitude and lights, ended up being a nightmare for one family in Alice.
On New Year's Eve, the Garcia family got together to welcome the new year, not realizing their lives were about to change in just a few moments.
"We had been popping fireworks. We popped a pretty good amount of fireworks," said family Patriarch Ruben Garcia. "We stopped at midnight and just waited around and watched the other people pop fireworks, went inside and fell asleep."
Garcia was woken from his sleep by his neighbor, alerting him that his property had caught on fire.
"My doorbell started to ring really fast," Garcia said. "And I thought 'what's going on? So when I went to the front door, I saw my neighbor and she said 'hey, something's on fire in the back.'"
One by one, all of Garcia's kids were taken out of the house, as well as his wife. However, he had to go in the engulfed house one more time for the family dog who was in a cage.
"I could see the dog crying and I didn't want to leave it so I ran in there and grabbed it," Garcia said. "I burned my hand a little bit on the cage because the cage was already so hot."
Garcia said luckily the dog was taken out of the house on time and only suffered a few burns, and is expected to be okay. While Garcia lost many of his possessions, he understands as a first responder the situation could have been much worse.
"I've been to these calls, I've gone to these calls, but I never thought I would be the call," Garcia said. "That's what happened this time. It was scary knowing my family could've been hurt. It was horrifying."
The Garcia's are staying with family and have been given donations, and are grateful for the communities support.
If you would like to donate money to the family, you can send it to this Cash App username: $amandagarcia910
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