A Tale of Two Tragedies: Local Artist Impacted by Fires in Palm Harbor & Dunedin

Sabrina Tropf has no medical training, no experience with traumatic injuries, and no history of being involved in fires.

But in the span of four days last week the Clearwater resident, who has her own line of , found herself in the midst of not one, but two unfortunate fire-related incidents, one in which she wound up playing the role of caregiver to a burn victim.

"Yeah, it's been a heck of a week," she said on Tuesday afternoon.

After losing most of her items in the antique mall fire in Dunedin last Wednesday, Tropf and a girlfriend decided to enjoy a dinner at Palm Harbor's on Saturday night as a way to unwind.

“It was the first time I had ever been there,” Tropf said. “My girlfriend suggested we go there because she heard it was really good.”

Little did she know she would soon find herself in the middle of one of the strangest and unfortunate accidents in recent memory.

According to Tropf, a party of five sitting adjacent to her seat at the bar had just finished their dinner and were waiting for dessert, when a waiter began putting the finishing touches on two dishes of Bananas Foster, a flambé made with rum.

The next thing she knew, everything around the group's table quickly became engulfed in flames, including a young woman who appeared to take the brunt of the fire.

“Suddenly, all I saw was the whole table go on fire, and then the people (too). It went from the table to the people. It was the craziest, fastest thing I had ever seen.”

Tropf recalled what followed was a chaotic scene, with people shouting, employees attempting to extinguish the fire, and the woman crying out for help.

“Everybody was burned, but this one woman was burned so bad. I just ran over there and put my arm on her back…and tried to help her. I was even kissing her arm that wasn’t burned.”

“I didn’t want her to see her own hand. She was already screaming in agony. She kept saying “pray for us, pray for us”. I felt the only thing I could try to do was distract her from seeing her arm.”

The victim has as Katie Hudgins, a 25-year-old first grade teacher at .

Tropf, who says she normally would have reacted with trepidation when it comes to a situation like that, found herself compelled to help the victim any way she could, perhaps because of her involvement with the Knot on Main fire.

Despite her unprovoked act of kindness, which prompted a Facebook message from the victim’s sister thanking her for her actions, Tropf doesn’t want to be seen as trying to gain anything from her involvement in this unfortunate incident.

“I don’t want any recognition from tragedy. My heart hurt for her because she was in such agony, and I wanted to do anything I could to help her,” she said, “Who would have thought ordering dessert could be tragic?”