Carmen Dixon screamed as the heat attacked her car. Flames shot skyward a few feet away as she drove past.
She was leaving her North Druid Hills job processing medical records heading toward her Riverdale home along I-85 when she noticed the first sign of trouble about 6:20 p.m.
“I saw a black mass of smoke,” said the 21-year-old Georgia State student.
Dixon trudged through traffic closer to the source of the smoke – and the flames.
“I felt the fire touching me through my window,” she said. “I heard a snap or a crackle noise … I saw the flames rising.”
As the car heated up, her 2-year-old Maltipoo named Diego started to freak out.
A video she provided to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution shows how close she was to the fire. She yelps while speeding past the flames.
As for Diego: “He was just ready to go home.”
Clear of the fire, she called her brother, an East Point firefighter. He told her to get out of there. She was happy to say she already had.