Justin Starbuck woke up in the early hours of April 17 to the smoke alarm going off in his Graham home and his wife yelling that there was a fire.
Starbuck ran upstairs and smelled smoke burning the home. Flames were coming from the ceiling, he said. Starbuck, his wife, their 9-year-old son and their dog were able to get out of the house which would soon burn to the ground.
Starbuck and his family lived in home, once filled with their hopes and dreams, since 2018. He envisioned his grandchildren being there one day. That was all taken away in one night.
Graham Fire & Rescue was dispatched to the 32000 block of Whitman Lake Drive East. The department wrote on X at 7:50 a.m that the house was a total loss. The Pierce County Fire Marshal’s Office is investigating, but preliminary results show the fire started at the electrical panel.
“It was our dream house, and I was hoping it would be my forever home. It doesn’t feel real,” Starbuck recently told The News Tribune.
Starbuck said he went back inside the home to grab car keys. After bursting through a door of flames, he received second-degree burns on his arms, glass on his back and several scrapes. Starbuck is recovering, and no one else in the home was injured.