Home burns moments before four-week lockdown

Thursday, 26 March 2020

Emergency services are investigating a house fire on Pine Ave, Hamilton, on Thursday morning.

Moments before the country went into a four-week lockdown, a house in Hamilton went up in flames.

Emergency services were called to the house fire on Pine Ave, Melville, about 10.50pm on Wednesday night, fire northern communications centre shift manager Carren Larking said.

Three fire trucks attended the fire, which was well ablaze when crews arrived.

A neighbour, Bernadette Hoareau, said she initially thought it was their sleepout on fire.

The fire occurred just before the country was put into a four-week lockdown.

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'My mum started screaming, she thought it was the sleepout as well.'

They got their kids and dog and got outside as Hoareau said they were worried because the fire was so close to them.

'I was worried for my mum as the sleepout is right next door to their house.

'Our daughter was scared, she just went white when she saw the flames.'

They had been told their neighbour's dog had died in the fire, which she said was sad.

'Her dog and my dog would run up and down the fence line barking to each other.

'Their dog would always wait at the crossing for the school kids to get his pats and cuddles, all the kids knew him.'

She was worried about where her neighbour had gone and wanted to offer help and see if they needed anything.

Waikato Area Commander Daryl Trim said in terms of housing people if their homes were destroyed during this period, it did not change much from what they had in place normally.

'They have to have somewhere to live, so it's whatever we can find.

'There's plenty of motel or hotels they can stay in.

'It's an essential thing, obviously shelter is essential.'

Their staff were taking extra precautions to be as safe as they could be when attending call-outs during the lockdown.

'Any medical calls where people might potentially have Covid-19, we dress up extra for our personal protection.'

At present, he said hardly any staff were self-isolating so crews were functioning as normal.

'It's not affecting our ability to respond at the moment but it's something we are having to keep an eye on day to day.'

He said if people behaved and followed the guidelines they should be good.

The fire was contained at 11.20pm and a fire safety officer would be returning to the house on Thursday to determine the cause of the fire.