FIREFIGHTER DEALS WITH BLAZE : NEWBURY PARK MAN TAKES DISASTER IN STRIDE, GRATEFUL FAMILY ESCAPED.

Byline: Enrique Rivero Daily News Staff Writer

Facing disaster is commonplace for Los Angeles city Firefighter Scott Miller, who escaped Friday with his family from their burning home.

In the span of four years, Miller was shot in the face during the Los Angeles riots, saw his Granada Hills home rattled in the Northridge Earthquake and Friday watched the home where he's lived the past two years go up in flames.

Yet only a few hours after firefighters contained the blaze at his Pacific Circle home, Miller sat calmly in the sunshine at a neighbor's house, a light breeze ruffling his hair as he smiled and chatted with neighbors while watching investigators across the street trudge through the home's charred remains.

He has everything to be thankful for, Miller says, because he and his wife and two children, and even the family's 14-year-old dog, made it out safely during the early morning fire.

``I am relaxed,'' he said, stopping to chat and smile and joke with an endless stream of friends and neighbors.

``They're going to board my house up this evening and once they board it up I'll look for a place to live. After I've found a place to live then I'll worry about this,'' he said, pointing toward the home.

``This is going to be a rough time for my family, but it won't be unbearable,'' said Miller, 37.

The Ventura County Fire Department on Friday afternoon was still trying to determine the cause of the 12:51 a.m. blaze that burned the garage and two bedrooms of the 2,000-square-foot house in the 400 block of Pacific Circle.

According to fire officials, the blaze apparently began in the garage and worked its way up toward the attic. The fire was contained at 1:25 a.m.

On April 29, 1992 - the first night of the Los Angeles riots following the acquittal of four Los Angeles police officers charged with beating Rodney King - Miller was critically injured when he was shot in the face by a reputed gang member while rushing to a fire.

The shooting left him partially paralyzed. He now is a captain assigned to the department's fire prevention bureau. Thurman Ivory Woods was subsequently sentenced to 16 years in prison after pleading no contest to the shooting.

On Friday, Miller recounted his early morning experience.

Miller said he and his family were asleep when something awoke his wife, Kathi, who in turn woke him up and went with him to the two front bedrooms above the garage where son Ryan, 9, and daughter, Julianne, 7, were asleep.

Looking out the windows they saw the glow of the fire in the garage below. They grabbed the children and ran out of the house.

Neighbor Casey Sander, the actor who plays Wade on the television show ``Grace Under Fire'' and lives directly across the street from the Millers, showed some grace under fire - literally - when he ran to the family's aid.

Sander said he was in the family room when his children's nanny rushed in saying the Millers house was burning. The woman called 911.

Sander said he hurried outside, saw the house in flames, and then ran to the Miller's living room window and smashed it.

``I just started screaming for these guys to get out of there,'' he said.

As he was going in through the broken window, the Millers came around the side of the house to the front, where he joined them and helped get the children out of harm's way. Miller tried to fight the blaze with a garden hose, Sander said.

Sander, who suffered cuts to his arms when he smashed the window, said he admired how Miller is handling the situation.

``I feel very sad for them, but I also feel very lucky to have met a man like him who has handled this with such class,'' Sander said.

On Friday afternoon, the Millers and friends watched as investigators made their way through the garage - where the family's two burned cars sat inside and a couple of bicycles lay in a charred tangle nearby.

Despite everything he's gone through recently, Miller said he isn't bitter. He did tell his wife that maybe they should go on a cruise, but she told him she wasn't interested.

As far as Miller is concerned, the fire was ``a walk in the park'' compared with other situations he's witnessed, where the victims weren't as lucky and loved ones were lost.

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2 Photos

Photo: (1--SIMI and CONEJO--color in CONEJO) Scott and K athi Miller examine the remains of their charred garage.

(2--CONEJO only) Ventura County firefighters battle the flames at the Miller family's home Friday morning. Investigators have not yet determined the fire's cause.

Jeremy Greene/Special to the Daily News