HUNTINGTON BEACH : Woman Dies After Fire in Residence

A 61-year-old woman, bedridden and terminally ill, died early Monday after a fire broke out in her home on Agate Circle, authorities said.

The victim’s husband, William Summerfield, said a hot plate warming a tea kettle in his wife’s bedroom was knocked to the floor by their cat and probably touched off the blaze. He had been using the hot plate and kettle of water to generate steam in an attempt to make his wife more comfortable, he said.

“The cat must have knocked the damn thing down and I didn’t see it,” said a grief-stricken William Summerfield, who lived with his wife at the same home for 27 years. “It must have smoldered and smoldered and then ignited the blaze.”

Summerfield said his wife Barbara had suffered from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a disease of the motor nerves commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, for several years and had recently lost her ability to move.

He said he went into the bedroom several hours before the fire after hearing strange noises over an intercom. He found a transmitter on the floor but did not see the hot plate, he said.

About three hours later, at 11:59 Sunday night, while Summerfield was in his study at the back of the house, the smoke alarm went off, he said. By 12:11 a.m., firefighters had the blaze under control, restricting damages to an estimated $13,000, Battalion Chief Mick Terich said.

Firefighters carried Barbara Summerfield from the house. She was not seriously burned but died at the scene of undetermined causes, Terich said.