Dad of fatal fire family: We were about to start new life

A HUSBAND whose wife and two children died after a blaze at their home has revealed they were due to join him for a new life in the US.

Fatoumatta Hydara, 28, and his daughters Naeemah, one, and Fatimah, three, died in hospital following the fire.

Aboubacarr Drammeh , who was in the US at the time, said he was in the process of securing visas for his family. The devastated 40-year-old was planning to move them to Minnesota, where he works as a biomedical technologist.

He said: “We had an interview booked for November 29. That would have been the final interview before we would hopefully have secured their visas. That’s not going to happen now and I can’t understand why.”

Mr Drammeh revealed how he spent his 40th birthday in the hospital mortuary, adding: “That was just so hard.” He said he last spoke to his wife a few hours before the fire, which gutted their first-floor flat in Clifton, Nottingham, on November 20. He added: “We joked among ourselves and kept talking about the upcoming trip and about her coming to America.”

And Mr Drammeh said of his girls: “They were both really happy children.”

Neighbour Jamie Barrow, 31, has been charged with three counts of murder. He will appear at Nottingham crown court today.

TRAGEDY The family of four