Brothers aged 2 and 3 killed in house blaze
Mother escapes with older son
TWO young brothers died in a house fire despite frantic efforts from neighbours to save them.
The mother of the boys, who were aged two and three, ran into the street screaming for help as the blaze took hold.
Her neighbours bravely attempted to reach them in their bedroom, but were beaten back by choking black smoke.
Emergency services brought out the children and tried in vain to resuscitate them on the lawn. The boys were later pronounced dead in hospital.
Last night the brothers were named locally as Jake and Logan. Their mother Emma Taylor escaped with her six-year-old son when the fire broke out at 2pm on Saturday.
The boys’ father, Jamie Casey, returned home from work to the devastating scene at the semidetached house in Huddersfield.
Neighbour Marcin Wojciechowski described how he fought to reach the trapped boys after being alerted by their mother’s cries.
He said: ‘My wife heard the woman’s screams and saw her running with her child.
‘She began shouting that her other children were still inside. I ran across to try get them out with another man, but unfortunately the black smoke did not allow us to enter. We tried to get in again from the garden by breaking the windows but couldn’t get in that way either.’
He said they eventually managed to get inside – but the fire had spread so quickly they were forced to abandon their efforts when they couldn’t find the boys.
Firemen wearing breathing apparatus eventually found Jake and Logan in a smoke-filled bedroom. Neighbour Shaveta Sharma, 37, arrived home to see the brothers ‘lying on the grass’. She said: ‘I couldn’t believe it. I arrived within three minutes of the fire brigade getting there.
‘Emma was screaming, she was hysterical. They brought one child out and I reassured her that there was just nothing we could do.
‘I was praying all night for the boys because no one was saying how they were getting on. I found out they didn’t survive on the news this morning. It is so, so tragic.’
Another neighbour said that the emergency services had tried in vain to ‘make them breathe’.
The youngsters were taken to hospital by ambulance, but nothing could be done for them.
An investigation has been launched into the blaze, which is being treated as a ‘tragic accident’. Chris Kirby, the area manager for West Yorkshire Fire Service, said 15 firemen attended the emergency.
But he added that even exper-ienced members of the crew were left devastated by the tragedy.
‘There were firefighters with tears in their eyes – they were obviously shaken up,’ he said.
‘Our crews worked very quickly to find the fire and extinguish it. They then rescued the boys who had suffered significant smoke inhalation.’
There were reports last night that the house had no working smoke alarms. However Mr Kirby refused to confirm this, saying: ‘These tragic instances are rare but having a smoke alarm can give people that bit of extra time to escape.’
He added that their ‘thoughts are with the family at this very difficult time’.