13-year-old Avante Weeks was playing a video game a little after midnight Tuesday when he heard popping noises outside his home in the Summit. "I thought someone had started a fire and might be roasting marshmallows or something. So I go to my back door, and I look where they normally have a fire, and they’re not there,” he told WIS News 10. “I’m like, ‘huh, that’s weird,’ and so I keep walking, I see the house completely, well, not completely on fire, but I saw a little bit of it starting.”
He ran out to the house without a shirt or shoes on. He was pounding on the door and yelling to wake up the family.
Columbia-Richland firefighters responded to the blaze and worked until 5 a.m. to get it under control. The fire destroyed the original home, the Weeks’ home and another nearby. But thanks to Avante’s decisive actions, fortunately, no one was injured.
Avante will be attending 8th grade at Kelly Mill Middle School this Fall.