Doctors at the Washington Hospital Center’s Burn Center gave Jerry Yurow between a 2 percent and 5 percent chance to live when he first arrived early on the morning of Jan. 30.
Yurow, whose North Bethesda town home quickly became engulfed in flames after a floor outlet malfunctioned, suffered second- and third-degree burns on about 30 percent of his body and had a severe case of smoke inhalation.
“My doctors tell me that for my age and everything, I have made a marvelous recovery,” said Yurow, who was 73 at the time of the fire and is 74 now. “It took a lot of work to get there.”
This week, Yurow and his daughter will attend the Phoenix World Burn Congress in Indianapolis, an annual conference of burn survivors, caregivers, burn care professionals and firefighters.
Last week, Yurow met with the three Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Service (MCFRS) medics who transported him from his home on Brewer House Road near Tuckerman Lane to the hospital Jan. 30.
Medics Craig Parton, Jackie Pickett and Ryan Wilt were among the first responders to Yurow’s town home a little after 1:30 a.m. More than 100 firefighters were called to the scene to put out the fire and prevent it from spreading to adjacent town homes.
“It took incredible tenacity by Mr. Yurow to survive what he did,” MCFRS spokesperson Pete Piringer said. “Every time we checked in on him, he was so strong-willed and had the right approach. With his age and what were really significant injuries, the odds were not in his favor.”
After about six weeks in intensive care, three more weeks in the Washington Hospital Center’s “Stepdown” unit, another few weeks at the MedStar National Rehabilitation Hospital in Washington, D.C. and almost a month in the physical therapy program at the Hebrew Home in Rockville, Yurow moved into his own new apartment at The Grand building in North Bethesda.
He does sit-ups and push-ups for exercise each morning and tries to get in some walking every day. He said he hopes to soon get back to swimming, his favorite sport, but must wait until some of the burn wounds on his head fully heal.
The raspy voice he had from weeks of being incubated in the hospital has improved and he returned to his Potomac synagogue over the summer to chant a weekly Torah portion.
He’s come a long way from late-January, the day an electrical malfunction in his living room left him with life-threatening injuries.
Inside of Jerry Yurow's North Bethesda town home after a fire destroyed it Jan. 30, via Pete Piringer/MCFRS
One of the first police officers on the scene Jan. 30 took this photo of Jerry Yurow's town home engulfed in flames, via Pete Piringer/MCFRS?
It was about 1 a.m. Jan. 30. Yurow said he was upstairs getting ready to go to bed when he heard “a kind of buzzing sound downstairs,” at his Brewer House Road town home.
The smoke alarm sounded. He put back on all of his clothes, except for socks and shoes, and rushed downstairs to see sparks coming out of an unused electrical outlet on the floor. The socket was partially covered by a sectional sofa.
He grabbed a fire extinguisher and aimed at the electrical outlet, but the extinguisher didn’t work. He ran upstairs to grab a second fire extinguisher, pulled the trigger and “it made things worse,” Yurow said.
The sofa burst into flames. He dropped the extinguisher and headed to the front door. As he grabbed the door knob, part of the roof of his house collapsed, creating a dark cloud of smoke and debris. He left his town home on his stomach, yelling for help.
He got to a neighbor’s house and the neighbor called 911. Police officers were the first to show up at the scene because the fire had tripped a security alarm in Yurow’s house.
“I wasn’t even aware that I had been burned,” Yurow said. “I knew my hands and my feet hurt.”
Firefighters told Yurow later that it’s likely he was burned in the thick cloud of smoke.
At the hospital, doctors put tubes in Yurow’s lungs and were pumping out black fluid. His face and much of his upper body were covered in bandages.
“I had two eyeholes and I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t see really,” Yurow said. “I looked like a mummy.”
Yurow said his daughter was vital in helping him through the recovery process and with filing insurance claims and other financial documents. “She’s kind of been a nurse and chief operating officer combined,” Yurow said.
Yurow, who retired in 2009 from the U.S. Department of Energy, is now able to get to outpatient appointments at the Washington Hospital Center on his own via Metro.
Soon after he returns from the Phoenix World Burn Congress, he’ll move into a new apartment at the Pallas building at Pike & Rose.
“I’m feeling pretty good,” Yurow said, “and I can’t wait to get back to swimming again.”
