By Anne Ruisi
A Vestavia Hills High School senior is being hailed as a hero and was honored with the Medal of Valor from the city of Mountain Brook after saving an elderly woman from a house fire.
John Michael Chandash, 17, not only managed to wake the 87-year-old woman sleeping on her couch by banging on a locked door and getting her out of the house, he gave her his shoes to wear when they got outside and he saw she was barefoot.
“I’m telling you, that was one great move on his part,” said Leland Rhudy, Mountain Brook’s fire marshal. “We would not have had a good outcome” if the teen hadn’t responded when he smelled the smoke.
The fire occurred on the evening of Aug. 29, when Chandash was visiting his grandparents’ home on Brookwood Road, an unincorporated area of Jefferson County that’s in the Mountain Brook Fire District. He said he forgot his backpack in the car – something he said he does a lot and described as a bad habit. When he went out to get it, he smelled smoke, which seemed to come from the neighbor’s house.
Chandash knew the elderly woman who lived there had hearing loss, so he called 911 to report the fire and ran over to the house. Peering through the decorative glass in the front door, he saw the glow of flames in the background while she slept on the couch. That’s when he started banging hard on the door to wake her.
“There was a moment when I thought she was dead, she was so asleep,” he said.
He thought about breaking down the door – he’s a nose guard on the Rebels’ varsity squad – but the woman woke and answered the door. Inside the smoke was like a light fog. Chandash started to lead her to safety, but she wanted to go upstairs in the house. He didn’t let her.
Once outside, Chandash, who’d noticed she was barefoot, gave her his own shoes to wear. His were too large for the woman, but they offered foot protection when he guided her off the porch and down the driveway as the Mountain Brook Fire Department arrived.
“I just saw it and I did it,” Chandash said. “It’s like when you’re fishing, and you see the bobbers go under the water and you just react.”
Fire department officials initially thought the young man was the woman’s grandson because he was so solicitous of her as they put out the fire, Mountain Brook Chief Chris Mullins said. “He was very selfless.”
The source of the fire, which caused fire, smoke and heat damage, is being investigated by the homeowner’s insurance company, Rhudy said.
Neither Chandash nor the woman were injured in the incident, but the teen said breathing the next day and night was a bit uncomfortable, accompanied by a stinging sensation.
Praise for the Hero
Lifesaving hero or not, school was in session the next day, but his teachers didn’t berate him for not having done his homework. “It was the best excuse not to do homework – ever,” he chuckled.
They also allowed him to postpone two tests scheduled for that day, including one in AP biology.
When his friends found out what had happened, social media at Vestavia High “blew up,” he said. “People asked, ‘Why didn’t you tell us?’”
“I do like being praised for it, but I didn’t seek the attention,” Chandash said.
Local media have brought the attention to him. His story was featured on Fox 6 news, and reporters have interviewed him or sought to tell his story.
The City of Mountain Brook bestowed on him the Medal of Valor at the Sept. 12 City Council meeting.
Chandash, who is the son of Holly and Jay Chandash, said he’s thankful for the honor, but he is most thankful he was in the right place at the right time.
“If there is a moral to this story, it’s to keep up your bad habits,” he said, referring to forgetting his backpack in the car. “You might just save someone’s life.”
