Many of you know Ela Heyn as a founding member of SOS, a charity that has done tremendous work to support ferret shelters and has been invaluable with some of the larger rescues in recent years. Sunday night Ela had a fire at her house. She was taken to the hospital with minor burns and minor smoke inhalation. She will be fine physically. (She was treated and released that night.) Regretfully only one of her four ferrets made it, her little girl, Bebe. An extremely kind animal control officer delivered Bebe to Yvonne DeCarlo of Fuzztek. Yvonne gave Bebe a once over, listened to her lungs, and looked for any evidence of burns. Thankfully she is fine--acting like a banshee. Sadly Theodore, Paddington, and Little Bear did not survive. Ela's apartment was pretty much a total loss. Between things that actually burned and massive smoke damage, most of her belongings are destroyed. Regretfully she had no insurance. She is temporarily living with Matt and Adria Rosette. Ela has done so much for the ferret community. Now she needs our help in return. Many items of furniture and some housewares have already been arranged for her, but what she needs is cash donations and gift cards to replace linens and clothing and such, and get together the security deposit on a new apartment for her and Bebe to live in. If you would like to send her a check or a gift card for JC Penney's, Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Target, Home Depot, Linens-N-Things, or Bed Bath & Beyond, it would be much appreciated. You can send them to her at the following address: Ela Heyn c/o Matt Rosette 52 Hedden Terrace North Arlington, NJ 07031-6109 Please do not send donations of household goods, clothes, etc. without contacting me first! We don't want her to end up with 18 sets of dishes, and right now she really doesn't have any place to store things. She also doesn't need any ferret related items at this time--everything she needs for the surviving ferret has already been donated or offered. Thanks you for keeping her in your thoughts and prayers at this difficult time, and thank you in advance for any help you can provide. Anne [Posted in FML issue 4838]