GPS detour leads Alabama driver to rescue Georgia family from house fire
Casey Sparks, an Alabama resident, helped save a couple and their 12 adopted children from a burning home in Lyerly, Georgia, on the night of 17 October. A GPS-suggested route had taken him to the neighbourhood.
A house fire in the community of Lyerly, in the US state of Georgia, on the night of 17 October put a couple, their 12 adopted children and a grandchild in danger while they slept. Everyone got out and no one was physically hurt. A key part in the rescue was played by Casey Sparks, a 37-year-old Alabama resident who happened to be passing after his GPS sent him on an unexpected route.
How the rescue unfolded
Sparks and his 13-year-old son, Cason, were driving home from a softball tournament in Dalton, Georgia, about 40 miles north-east of Lyerly. He said the navigation kept steering him toward the Burkes' community, even though the pair had travelled through nearby Chattanooga, Tennessee, on the way to the event. He followed it and saw a roof in flames, with the fire spreading through the rest of the house.
Sparks stopped outside, told his son to stay in the truck and call for emergency help, and went to a side door with another passerby. The door's lock had been broken and never repaired. He went inside after meeting a teenager who had grabbed a hose in a panic to fight the blaze and said there were other people in the house.
Sparks found James Burke asleep in a recliner and woke him. He then carried out the couple's 10-year-old granddaughter, who is blind, according to the journalist Rick Karle. Rather than wait for first responders, he went back in to lead Larita Burke and the remaining children out, including some with disabilities or special needs.
Aftermath
The fire brought the house down and destroyed the family's three vehicles. Its cause had not been determined at first. The couple told television station WRCB that they had fostered more than 500 children over the previous 15 years. Larita Burke said that five more minutes would have made the outcome different.
An online fundraiser organised by James Burke's sister had raised more than $11,000 by Monday morning. The money is meant to help the family rent a house big enough for all 14 of them while their home is rebuilt or replaced. Sparks said he believes divine intervention put him in the right place that night.
