A California girl saved her siblings from their burning home after she had a gut feeling that danger was imminent.

Many people claim to have experienced premonitions — those eerie, foreboding feelings that something unpleasant is about to happen. They can run from the mundane (knowing who's calling before answering the phone) to the disastrous (dreaming that a loved one will pass away). And sometimes they’re simply uneasy feelings that bad luck is on the horizon.

That’s exactly what 11-year-old Maria Elias of McFarland, California, experienced when she went to bed on Saturday night. "I couldn't go to sleep because I knew something was going to happen," Maria told KGET TV 17.

Sure enough, at 1:30 a.m., a fire broke out in her family's three-bedroom home, causing an estimated $85,000 worth of damage. Maria fought back tears as she told KGET how she got her two younger brothers and sister to safety and was holding her sister "tight" to ensure that she didn't leave her behind.

Yahoo! Shine could not reach Maria or her family for comment, and it’s unclear exactly how the little girl ushered her siblings to safety. However, Corey Wilford of the Kern County Fire Department told Yahoo! Shine, “Based on witness testimony, the fire was electrical. A person who was sleeping in the home heard a loud pop and smelled smoke, then saw fire erupt on the wall.”

According to a Kern County Fire Department press release emailed to Yahoo! Shine, two people escaped through a window in the home, and in total, eight adults and 12 children were displaced by the fire. All are now being assisted by the American Red Cross.

“I would advise people to have at least one working smoke detector in the home,” said Wilford. “Replace your batteries twice a year and test the detector once a month to make sure it’s functioning. Also, vacuum the detector periodically because dust can prevent it from sensing smoke, or even set off false alarms.” (Visit the National Fire Protection Association website for more tips.)

Whether or not Elias experienced a premonition — and whether premonitions actually even exist — is a hotly debated topic. While many in the spiritual world have long accepted premonitions as fact, science has begun to explore the phenomenon as well. A recent study conducted by Northwestern University found that the human body can react to danger before the brain is conscious of the impending event. And research conducted by Cornell University found that people were able to predict with 53.4 percent accuracy where a photo was located when asked to choose between two locations. Not statistically mind-blowing, but according to a story published in Popular Science, the results were more impressive than the 50 percent accuracy rate that might be expected by chance.

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