February 17, 1990

Boy saves piano instructor from fire

       Twelve-year-old Giancarlo Dimizio wasn’t feeling too well Wednesday afternoon, and he almost skipped his piano lesson. But his instructor, Albert Siska, is glad he decided to show up. Dimizio’s mother dropped him off around 4 p.m. in front of Siska’s house in White River Township. It was to be the boy’s second day as a student under Siska, a semi-retired pianist and entertainer. But when he got to the front door, Dimizio knew something was wrong. “As soon as I got out of the car I smelled smoke,” recalled Dimizio, who goes by the name of John. “ I didn’t think it was anything big. Then when I got onto the front porch, I heard the fire alarm going off inside the house.” The front door of the house, in the 500 block of Leisure Lane, is hidden behind a brick wall. So Dimizio’s mother had no reason to think anything was wrong, and she drove home. Her son, standing outside in the rain, rang the doorbell and called Siska’s name. But there was no answer. Then he looked in a kitchen window and saw smoke, and a small fire on the stove. And he saw Siska lying on the floor in the kitchen. “That really freaked me out,” Dimizio said. “I thought he was dead. I wanted to something real quick.” He tried to get in through the front door, but it was locked. So he went to a neighbor’s house to get help. “They had company, so I just said, “I’m sorry to bother you, and told the neighbor the whole story,” Dimizio said. They went back to the Siska home, found an unlocked door and entered the house. They went to the kitchen, but the smoke was so thick they had to give up before getting Siska out. “I yelled his name and he answered once,” Dimizio said. “I heard a faint sound.” The neighbor also called the White River Township Fire Department, and three fire engines and a sheriff’s deputy soon arrived. With air masks, firefighters were able to get the man out and take him to a neighbor’s house. “I think he was unconscious because he didn’t know what had happened.” Dimizio said. “He looked at me and I said, ‘Do you remember me, at least?’ and he said ‘yeah,’ and he patted me on the head.” In a few minutes, Siska was placed in an ambulance and taken to Community Hospital South in Indianapolis. Dimizio was feeling the affects of the smoke too but decided not to go to the hospital. The fire caused no damage to the house. But Pat McDaniel of the fire department said it would have been much worse if Dimizio has not been there. “Had he not reacted, I’m sure the man would have been dead,” McDaniel said. The smoke was so heavy that Siska would have suffered serious smoke inhalation, and the fire could have erupted into a major blaze in a matter of minutes. And because of the wall in front of the house, the fire could have burned for quite awhile in the kitchen before anyone noticed. Siska, 65, remains in the hospital, where he has been undergoing tests to determine exactly what had caused him to pass out Wednesday afternoon. His wife, Agnes, said doctors plan to release him Tuesday unless they find some health problem. She was at work when the fire broke out, and her husband doesn’t remember what happened before Dimizio came into the house. So they can only speculate about what went on. But she believes her husband started to fix dinner, then began feeling ill and may have gone to the bedroom to sleep. Then he woke up, possibly when the fire alarm went off, and went to the kitchen, where he passed out, either because of the illness or because of the smoke. Agnes Siska said she and her husband have much to be grateful for. “I would call it real lucky,” she said-lucky that Dimizio showed up when he did and  lucky that the contractors who were working on the house that day left a door unlocked when they finished. That gave Dimizio and the neighbor a way of getting in the house. Dimizio, meanwhile, is glad he decided to go to his piano lesson that day at Siska’s house. “If I hadn’t come, he would have died,” he said. But he’s still trying to convince some of his teachers and classmates at Our Lady of Greenwood School. “Some people believe me but some don’t,” he said. “Like my teachers-they think I’m screwing around."  (Reprinted with permission from the Daily Journal)

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