FARMINGTON, Utah — Jaclyn Anderson woke up in the middle of the night to the smell of smoke coming from her basement, which came from an unlikely source.
“We were sound asleep and just heard all of our smoke alarms going off," she said. "[I] just hear my son screaming and running up the stairs and yelling 'fire.'”
She went downstairs to find her son’s Frigidaire Mini Retro Beverage Refrigerator was on fire. In a panic, she called 911, and a crew from the Farmington Fire Department arrived within minutes.
“It had short in it, which caused it to heat up and then catch on fire, which spread from the back of the fridge up the wall," said Tommy Franco, an engineer paramedic with the fire department.
This isn’t the first time a refrigerator has caught on fire, he said.
"It was a freezer in the garage, the last one I was on," said Franco. "It does happen.”
Anderson shared what happened on Facebook, advising others to keep the mini fridges out of their bedrooms.
“They're in so many homes," she said. "I know all of his little friends have these fridges in their room, and we see them wherever we go. They're so popular.”
Her son had moved the fridge from the ground beside his bed to a shelf on the other side of his room just days before, said Anderson.
“It could have been so much worse if we wouldn't have been home," she said. "Our whole house could have caught fire. More importantly, it could have really hurt my child.”
No matter how small the fire, never hesitate to call 911, said Franco. Firefighters come to work every day to keep people in their communities safe.
FOX 13 did reach out to Frigidaire multiple times to comment on the fire, but the company did not respond.
