Fireman gave phone to desperate brother and said: ‘Tell your sister you love her’

AS her three-year-old son collapsed in her arms, Zainab Dean phoned her brother for help.

Outside the blazing tower block and powerless to rescue his sister and her son himself, Francis Dean tried to guide them out of the building before handing his phone to a fireman.

Mr Dean said the fireman told her help was on its way – and then handed the phone back to him with the words: ‘ Tell her you love her.’

Mr Dean said: ‘I knew then to fear the worst. The phone went dead and I couldn’t talk to her.’

He said that his sister (pictured left) first rang him at 1.38am.

‘She said there was a fire in the building,’ he recalled. ‘She was very nervous and scared, she is a nervous person anyway.

‘She said the fire service arrived and had told everyone to keep calm and to stay where she was.

‘When I got to the building, which took me about 20 minutes, she was still in there. I was talking to her on the phone and said to her “don’t worry they ( fire service) are coming”.

Mr Dean said he was prevented several times from entering the building himself by the police during the two hours between arriving outside and his last contact with his sister at 3am.

‘On the phone I just kept telling her they were coming to get her.’ Miss Dean moved with her son to a neighbouring flat where she told her brother it was safer. Mr Dean said: ‘She had been in there an hour and I could see the building was going up in flames. I said “Zainab you have to get out of the building, it’s not looking good”.

‘She said she didn’t want to go down the stairs because there was too much smoke.

‘ But she tried anyway and then Jeremiah collapsed in her arms. She was terrified but I told her she had to give him mouth-to-mouth.’

At around 3am Mr Dean said a fireman spoke directly to his sister to try to reassure her. He said: ‘He told her to keep calm and that they were coming to get her. He kept saying that again and again.

‘But then he handed me the phone and said to me “Tell her you love her”. I knew then to fear the worst.’

‘Then and after that I couldn’t get through to her.’

Mr Dean said he did not know if his sister had made it out of the building and he questioned why she was told to stay inside.

He added: ‘She was on the 14th floor. If she ran at the beginning instead of listening to the advice, she would be here now.

‘That beautiful baby should be here now. I don’t know where they are, I don’t know what to do. I feel sick with worry.’

Mr Dean, who works for a distribution firm, added: ‘I’m so upset. Jeremiah was a wonderful boy, always happy, always smiling. He loved playing football with me.’

He said he had seen his sister earlier in the day and she had been preparing for a job interview.