Smithtown Teen Saves Family During Fire

SMITHTOWN, NY — A Smithtown teen is being hailed as a hero after alerting her sleeping family to a fire.

On Friday at about 2:30 a.m., Hailee Hurtado, 15, smelled smoke in her Stuyvesant Lane home. She quickly alerted her sleeping father, Jonathan, who discovered a fire in the garage of their ranch home, fire officials said.

Her father woke up her mother and other daughter, while Hailee went to the lower level of the residence, where the fire originated, to get her elderly grandmother.

Hailee awoke her grandmother, who uses a cane, and assisted her out of bed and began guiding her toward the front door where she was met by her father. The two assisted the grandmother up the flight of stairs and outside. By the time the family exited the building, the garage was engulfed in fire and it was extending up the exterior to the upper level.

Smithtown firefighters were alerted of the fire at 2:30 a.m. First on scene was Ex-Chief John Hansen, who lives nearby and radioed for help. Firefighters extinguished the fire and no one was hurt.

Firefighters commended Hailee for her heroic actions in alerting her family.

"If she had delayed in warning her family members, those extra seconds could have spelled a very different outcome. The chiefs intend to present Hailee with an award for her actions at a later date," the Smithtown Fire Department said in a news release.