BY Taiwo George
About two weeks after Emmanuel Omogbo, a Nigeria-born star basketball player for Colorado State University, lost his parents, nephew and niece to a fire accident in the United States, Jeremiah Owojori, another US-based Nigerian, has died along his five-year-old son, while his pregnant wife and another son, are in a critical condition.
This as a result of a fire incident at Owojori’s residence at 201 Coleman Street in West Monroe.
A neighbour of the deceased, who escaped unhurt, said Oworoji experienced power outage at his residence around 3:30am on Sunday and he informed a maintenance officer of the development three hours later.
“It is unknown whether the family returned to sleep before being discovered by firefighters,” KTBS, an American news outfit, said in its report.
Rescue officials transported Owojori and his seven-month-old son to a hospital, where they were placed on life support; and Ashley, his 24-year-old pregnant wife, and Halley, her 5 year-old son, were taken to LSU Medical Centre in Shreveport, where they remained in critical condition.
“Investigators determined the fire originated in the attic area just above the affected unit,” Brant Thompson, state fire marshall chief deputy, was quoted to have said.
“The fire started close to junction boxes and faulty wiring is suspected to have caused the fire.”
Mike Roberts, a local home inspector, blamed the incident on faulty wiring, saying the knob and tube, which were made about seven decades ago, were tied together with new modern wiring.
“By doing that you’ve created another fire hazard, you have a big wire and a little wire and one is bigger than the other and they are not supposed to be twisted together,” he said.
“Also when you cover knob and tube wiring with insulation you just created extra heat and you also made a second fire hazard.
“I don’t know who checked these things off but this is totally incorrect, it’s very sad four people are not only hurt they are on life support and it could have been avoided by simply getting a home inspection.”
Roberts advised any family moving into a new home to get it inspected in order to avoid such accident.
However, on Wednesday morning, Thompson confirmed the death of Halley, saying: “His father, mother and younger brother remain on life support, but they are not expected to survive.”
Sadly, Halley’s father died a day later. His death was confirmed by one Mayowa Kunle, his friend, who had been commenting on the incident since it happened.
“Sad News: Jeremiah Owojori died this evening!!!!!! Rest in Peace Jerry!!!”she wrote on Facebook.
Jeremiah and Ashley only got married in December 2014. On their first anniversary, the deceased, whose Facebook page gave out as religious, wrote: “Wow…tonight on our one year anniversary, we met this mighty man of God from Uganda and he thrilled us prophesying into our lives and Union.#blessedtobeablessing”.
Exactly a week to his death, he wrote: “Some trust in mountains and some trust in oceans, but I trust in the name of Jesus Christ.”
Tributes have been pouring in for the family, especially on social media.
“Even though I only met and talked to you for two hours at twin city tires, you made a lasting impact on my life. Sorry I didn’t get a chance to call you. Thanks for sharing your story with me,” Darnell Whittington wrote.
Lilian Grasso, another friend, wrote: “I am devastated about this. I am in shock. I just spoke to Jeremiah to wish him a blessed New Year ! I send my condolence to all family members… I am so sad about this news.”
Additional reports by David Atilola
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