Woman's lucky escape in chip pan fire

2:07pm Friday 18th May 2007

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A woman had a lucky escape after a chip pan fire started in her flat.

Firecrews from Hove were called to Storrington Close in Hangleton on Thursday evening to tackle the blaze, which started in the kitchen.

The woman had only taken her attention away from the pan for a moment but it was enough for it to catch alight.

Crew commander Darran (crct) Sampson said: "The flat did not have a smoke alarm so the first the woman knew there was a problem was when smoke came pouring into her front room.

"We arrived just in time to stop the fire from really taking hold and it was put out quickly although there was some damage to the kitchen. She was very lucky."

Firefighters gave the woman some oxygen because she had inhaled smoke and after being checked over by ambulance crews she did not need to go to hospital.

Mr Sampson said: "Neighbours rallied around to help and when we installed a smoke alarm in the woman's flat we discovered that quite a few others did not have alarms either.

"We distributed some of our leaflets which explain how we can carry out free home safety checks and install alarms and would urge people to take advantage of this if necessary."