Last summer at Yellowstone, my camp stove flared up just like that. I keep a metal lid from a pot right next to the stove now. If it flares, I slam that lid down to cut off the oxygen. Having a bucket of sand or water nearby is a good backup too. It's one of those things you don't think about until it almost goes wrong.
Seriously, squirrels are the worst for that. Was it doing something super weird, or just being a normal squirrel that somehow became the most interesting thing ever? I need to know how bad the distraction was before the table caught.