I know it happened a while ago, but still sad for the loss of the chicks CGG. It does remind me of an incident right after Thanksgiving, when we had our own tortilla incident, although nothing serious happened thank goodness.
DD was home for the holidays. She and I were watching a movie together and she thought a tortilla with shredded cheese under the broiler sounded good. She had just taken a shower so was in her bathrobe as she was also doing laundry at the time. So after several minutes of she and I watching the movie together she asks, "How long do I leave the tortilla under the broiler?" "WHAT? It's still in there?" I jumped up, ran into the kitchen just as it was filling up with smoke and opened the oven door only to see it was filled with flames! Quickly we slammed it shut and could only see fire through the oven window. I called 911 who told me to turn off the oven, leave the oven door closed and get everyone out of the house (the smoke was getting thicker at this point).
I sent DD downstairs to get her Dad and the dogs out of the house and waited on the front porch for the Fire Dept. Lily came out with me to the front and was almost in tears, apologizing. It was a freezing cold night outside and I removed the wide scarf I had around my neck and wrapped it around her. Within a few minutes the firemen came pulled the blackened cookie sheet and charred tortilla out of the oven and set a super heavy duty fan in the house to get the smoke out.
Of course, DD is standing there in the kitchen with me wearing her bathrobe and her hair in a towel, silently regretting that she hadn't had time to gussy up since all the firemen were super cute. All was okay, except for the burned cookie sheet, which the cute fireman suggested to Lily that she replace for Christmas.
She was not in trouble. I was so glad that this happened when she was home while I was there in the house rather than alone in her apartment in Pullman. There was clearly a lesson to be learned (never leave something under the broiler unattended!) and we were all safe with no serious damage to our home, or pets. I reminded myself of this several times the following day while I spent 3 hours cleaning the smoke and grime out of my oven and scraping it from the oven glass door. It happened for a reason, all was well and I was truly grateful.