I did one final check of the entire second floor and no one remained, so I headed down the stairwell and out into the frigid night to locate my family. I had thousands of dollars in electronics with me, between my computer, battery packs, watches, etc, etc, but I stayed calm and rational, all of that was replaceable and I wanted to be in and out of my room in a matter of seconds, so I didn't even attempt to take more than my wallet and keys.
I ducked back into my own room to grab my wallet and keys to our rental SUV, as I was now envisioning that we’d be spending a few hours out in the cold. My head hurts now just recreating this and thinking about it. The alarm noise leaves no doubt and certainly no desire to attempt to ignore it. It was amazing to me in that moment how many people were still attempting to wait this out in their rooms. There is a fire in the building, please evacuate immediately.” I direct my family down the stairs and then walk back the length of the second floor saying in a calm but loud voice, “There is a fire in the building, please evacuate immediately. Okay, shit, this is actually happening right now! He looked like he was being chased by a bear and he simply yelled, “FIRE!!” then promptly dove back into the stairwell and outta site.
As I was getting them all set someone barreled through the door onto the second floor, with their full rolling luggage bag in tow. I walked down the hall with Linda and Reed, towards my parents, whose room was directly across from the second floor stairwell. My own room, with my wife and son, was half a hallway away from my parents, but my mother and I somehow opened our doors into the main hallway in unison and I waved at her with that look that says “damn fire alarm, I guess we should evacuate just to be on the safe side.” She was informed that this was the fire alarm and she was to evacuate immediately. When the hotel alarms were triggered my mother thought it was her alarm clock, and she called front desk complaining that she couldn’t turn it off. We had of course booked our own hotel that evening, and we were all in fact sleeping soundly just minutes before, but currently there were a few hundred people braving the winter conditions in their pajamas as firefighters streamed into the building. Snow was accumulating on the ground and my family, collectively my parents, wife and son, were walking between the hotels in the immediate vicinity asking if they had any available beds for the night. The temps were just below freezing, with a stiff wind gusting over people. It was 1:30am on Wednesday, March 21st and we were in Knoxville, TN.
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