URBANA — Urbana firefighters rescued a man in a wheelchair and an 18-month-old child from a smoky house in east Urbana late Tuesday morning.

"We were 30 seconds away from this being extremely tragic," Urbana Fire Chief Mike Dilley said of a call to 2204 Country Squire Drive at 11:16 a.m.

Dilley said an extension cord failed, starting a fire in boxes full of mementos. The fire, confined to the boxes, filled the single-story ranch home with smoke.

"The resident is handicapped and he was having difficulty getting out of the house," Dilley said.

When firefighters came though the front door, they encountered smoke and got Berl Peavler out. He told them about his grandson, who firefighters found in a crib in a back room.

"When the guys got to the baby bed, the smoke level was to the top of the bed. They were able to pull the child out before he actually took in smoke," Dilley said. "We're living right today."

Dilley said the extension cord was plugged into a heater in a den that was not on.

"This extension cord failed and where it failed there was a stack of boxes from floor to ceiling. The fire was going up the boxes. We got it out almost immediately," he said.

"Fortunately, it didn't do a lot of damage because of early detection by the resident, who was home and noticed the smoke. If it had been in the middle of the night, this would be a fatality, and if no one was home, it would be a major house fire," Dilley said.

The chief took the opportunity to warn people never to use temporary extension cords on a full-time basis.

"This was not a lightweight extension cord. This was a heavy extension cord. The false expectation that just because a cord is heavy it's OK is not so," he said.

Firefighters were at the house about an hour. Dilley estimated smoke damage at $2,000.

Neither Peavler nor the child was harmed.