TEENAGE BURN VICTIM WORKS TO KEEP OTHERS SAFE FROM FIRE.

Byline: CAROL ROCK Staff Writer

VALENCIA -- Two playhouses high in the trees are all that are left of Michael Ewart's former home on Via Escovar in Valencia.

A green fence now surrounds the vacant lot where a devastating fire started by candles leveled the Ewarts' home in December.

``My brother has asthma and I heard him out in the hallway,'' 16-year-old Michael said, recalling the morning of the fire. ``He was yelling. I thought he was just sick and was gonna let my dad deal with it, but then I walked in the hallway and it was hot.''

What the house didn't have were working smoke alarms.

``We had them, but the batteries were dead,'' he said.

Michael, his brother, sister, father and grandparents escaped. But Michael and his father, David Ewart, were burned as they helped everyone flee through a second-story window.

After nearly a month at the Grossman Burn Center, and even longer in physical therapy, Michael told his mother, Jacqui, and stepfather, Fred Mabbott, that he wanted to do something to prevent what happened to him from happening to others.

Last month, the Michael Ewart Smoke Alarm Foundation had its first outreach efforts at a soccer game where Michael and friends handed out fliers reminding people to change the batteries in their home smoke alarms.

``When Michael came out of the hospital, he was trying to make sense of everything,'' Mabbott said. ``He wanted to have a purpose and try to ensure this didn't happen to other people.''

In September, Michael attended the World Burn Conference, a four-day event sponsored by the Children's Burn Foundation.

``The people who attended were at all different stages (of burn recovery),'' his mother said. ``Michael was the most recent. It helped him deal with what happened and inspired him.''

Michael now is vigilant about the family's smoke alarms, Jacqui said. Ironically, the family's smoke alarm went off while Michael was having his first meeting with a fire department official to discuss the foundation.

``It needed to have the batteries changed,'' she said. ``It made us realize how easy it is to forget, especially if you take out the batteries because it goes off unexpectedly. That's the message he's trying to get out.''

According to the National Fire Protection Association, home fires kill more Americans each year than all natural disasters combined. Eighty-two percent of all fire deaths occur in the home, according to the association.

And households with nonworking smoke alarms now outnumber those with no smoke alarms. Failure can be traced directly to missing, disconnected or dead batteries.

Michael has been busy doing his homework to develop materials for the foundation, researching fire safety Web sites and gathering statistics.

``I'm pretty passionate about trying to limit the number of people who get hurt,'' he said. ``It's relatively preventable.''

Right now, Michael is working through the tedious process of getting nonprofit status for the foundation. He has sponsors waiting to help -- Energizer has promised to donate batteries and First Alert will donate smoke alarms to those who cannot afford them.

``We designed a magnet that has reminders on it,'' Michael said. ``It tells you to test your alarms once a week, dust them once a month and change batteries twice a year.''

The foundation's mission is to ensure that every home in the Santa Clarita Valley has working smoke alarms. In addition to education, outreach and hardware, Michael has one more goal designed to return some of the generosity he's seen from his neighbors and friends.

``We want to give college scholarships to burn survivors who are making a difference in their community,'' he said. For more information on the foundation, visit www.me-safe.org or call [phone].

carol.rock(at)dailynews.com

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(color) Burn victim Michael Ewart, 16, has started a new foundation to promote the use of working smoke detectors.

David Crane/Staff Photographer