An Arlington Heights couple is raising awareness about a straightforward safety measure they credit with saving their home—and possibly their lives.
Though a fire devastated their kitchen and the main floor of their house, they survived, and now they are urging others to prioritize fire safety measures, inspired by guidance from their local fire department.
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“As you can see, they’re taking everything down: the ceiling, the walls, the floors,” Lynn Baldoni remarked on Tuesday.
Baldoni surveyed the main living area of her family’s home, which they’ve cherished for 25 years. The space is now stripped to its framework following a kitchen fire that broke out just before Thanksgiving.
“I came around the corner here, and this was all black smoke, just billowing out,” Baldoni recalled.
Lynn and her husband Thom initially attempted to manage the fire with a fire blanket and extinguisher, but soon realized they were outmatched by the blaze erupting from the oven.
“I went to open the back door to let the smoke out. Because I saw the smoke and I was standing there, and I looked back, and all of a sudden, flames are shooting up this wall here,” Thom Baldoni said.
The Baldonis are closing out 2025 living somewhere else temporarily while their home is repaired. But thanks to the efforts from the fire department installing a smoke detector just three months before the fire, they still have a home to come back to in 2026.
“No. 1, tax dollars at work, great, No.2, God bless them,” Thom Baldoni said.
The Arlington Heights Fire Department has installed nearly 700 smoke alarms in people’s homes throughout the village this year alone. The alarms are donated by the Illinois Fire Safety Alliance and free of charge to residents.
“When I first talked to them about this, they said, in another two minutes, everything would have been gone, our home, our dog, us, everything,” said Chris Rymut, Arlington Heights Fire Department division chief.
Instead, it’s an insurance claim and an inconvenience.
“I mean, it’s great. You know, we’d love to see everyone getting out safe. That’s always the biggest concern. And then after that, we always want to minimize the property damage,” firefighter and paramedic Michael Graf said.
And though the Baldonis couldn’t be home for Christmas this year, they know they have a lot to be thankful for.
“We got out. And our dog, Jack, got out, and that was the most important thing. Everything else was secondary,” Lynn Baldoni said.
“It’s just amazing that people like this give up their life to do the things that save people like us,” Thom Baldoni said.
To request smoke alarm installation in an Arlington Heights home, call AHFD at (847)-368-5450 or visit vah.com/smokealarm.
