Lower Bucks Fire Leaves Family Mourning Loss Of Cat, Home

LOWER BUCKS COUNTY, PA —An entire life changed within 30 minutes.

Less than one week ago, Kim and Tim O'Keefe and their family suffered a devastating loss in which their Buttonwood Lane home burned down and one of their cats died while the other is now fighting for its life.

Just before 5 p.m. Saturday, Levittown Fire Company No. 2 and Levittown Fire Company No. 1 responded to an attached garage on fire on Buttonwood Lane in the Birch Valley section of Levittown in Falls Township.

Fire crews found the garage fully engulfed. The fire had also extended to the first and second floors of the home, fire officials said.

The fire was brought under control within 45 minutes. There were no injuries to the residents.

The fire's cause is under investigation by the Falls Township Fire Marshal.

Two family members, Ashley Goldey and Marie LarsenBrown, organized a GoFundMe Page to help are organizing this fundraiser.

The GoFundMe page has reached $10,000 of its $15,000 goal.

The sister said that a battery in her sister's garage caught fire and that her brother-in-law tried to put it out with the fire extinguisher, but the battery exploded and caught fire fast.

She said the house was in flames within minutes.

Kim O'Keefe is an animal lover and two cats were inside. She recently had to put one of her furbabies down not even three months ago and was still heartbroken over that, her sister said.

She and her husband went into the house when it was on fire with black smoke pouring out, trying to find the cats.

"She did not find her one cat Loki, and the smoke was so bad and the heat was so intense she could not stay in the house," her sister said. "My brother-in-law said you could not even see your hand if you put your arm out. One cat was found and the firefighter whose name I do not know but we will call him an angel was outside performing CPR on the one cat, Odin."

He then provided oxygen for my sister's cat and sent it with my sister so she could take her baby to the ER. A neighbor my sister did not know well drove her and her cat to the animal hospital, the sister stated.

"The street of Buttonwood has some amazing neighbors," the sister said. When a community is struck by something like this, everyone comes out to offer help. Complete strangers. One little girl even brought size 8 shoes since my sister was without shoes."

Odin is in the ICU and is in critical condition but is responding well to medicine, the sister said.

Loki, the other cat, did not make it, the sister said.

"The house my niece was raised in was burnt down, my sister lost another furbaby, and one is fighting for his life," the sister said. "We are raising funds for my sister and her family. Mainly to help cover Odin's medical bills, which already are over $7,000, and then for everyday essentials. They have insurance and everything is replaceable in the house lives are not. but needs are now, and insurance will take a bit to process a claim, and they do not provide for a kitty who needs medical help now. Anyone who has taken an animal to emergency knows how expensive it is and how you need to pay or put a credit card down on file now for them to help your animal," the GoFundMe post read.