'We've finished crying'
2008-05-07 09:18
Betty's Bay - "We have nothing."
"Just the clothes we're wearing and Stevie."
Shani Lötter, with her Indian Ringneck Parakeet Stevie on her shoulder, and Nicky Joone told how a fire destroyed their Betty's Bay home and all their possessions early on Tuesday morning.
Sitting on a couch in Joone's parents' home, the couple looked tired.
"The whole mountain looked like a massive, burning coal," Joone said.
The fire started after an Eskom power cable was ripped loose by a strong wind, said the head of the Overberg's Department of Fire and Rescue Services Reinhardt Geldenhuys.
The cable was about 200m from the back of Lötter and Joone's home on the mountain slope.
On Tuesday, they tried not to lose their sense of humour after the traumatic experience. Stevie kept hopping from one shoulder to the other.
"We've finished crying, that's why we are laughing now."
Lötter believed her long-standing fear of strong winds probably had helped them to escape the flames.
Lötter and Joone got ready for bed at about 00:15 but the howling wind kept Lötter awake.
Even Joone's soothing words that "the wind can't do anything to you" couldn't calm her down and she put their takkies next to the bed.
Moments before she wanted to climb into bed, she heard an almighty bang.
"The whole house first went blue and then completely orange. We just grabbed our takkies, the car keys and Stevie."
"It took us 15 seconds to get out of the house."
Stunned they jumped in their car and rushed to Joone's parents.
"Almost immediately the whole house was surrounded by flames," Joone said.
Lötter grabbed Stevie first, "because he's like a child to me".
Neither Lötter nor Joone had insurance.
Joone's sister Maureen Enever went to the house on Tuesday morning to see what could be saved.
All their possessions had melted, however, and only three antique teacups from Lötter's grandmother could be saved from the house's smouldering remnants.