The Dangers of Hoarding

Environmental Contractor Matt Ferro has quite the job.

"I do crime scene clean up, clean up of death scenes," says Ferro, who owns Kleen Scene, based out of Hamburg.

He also responds to the homes of hoarders.

"They have an obsessive need to keep things."

Lots of things.

Ferro has been to homes so cluttered it's hard to walk through the front door.

"You find dead pets-- or pets the family did not even know they had. In a lot of these houses there's stacks of paper-- things that can easily ignite, It's dangerous," Says Ferro.

And it's deadly too.

In just the past year, firefighters have responded to several house fires where clutter has been an obstacle for them.

In December of 2009, three people were killed in Cheektowaga after an apartment caught fire. Firefighters told Eyewitness News they had a tough time battling the blaze due to the amount of debris and clutter in the apartment..." More