The smoke alarm saved our lives

Samantha Kelly was talking on the phone when she heard her smoke alarm sounding at her home in Singleton Crescent, Goring, last Thursday afternoon.

She rushed upstairs to find smoke coming from a tumble dryer in a bedroom. Her five-month-old baby Lillie was asleep in her cot in the next room.

Samantha, 39, said: "I could see the smoke coming out of the tumble dryer and an orange glow inside but there wasn't any flames. I turned it off then grabbed my baby. My two-year-old daughter Jessica was in the lounge so I got her and took them outside and left them with a neighbour as I called 999."

Samantha also called her partner Mark and calmly told him there had been a fire but that it was quite small.

"I thought the firefighters would probably just put it out with one of those hand extinguishers," said Samantha.

"But within minutes it really took hold. The window blew out and there was this explosion as the glass shattered. I could see the flames coming out of the side of the building.

"It couldn't have been more than eight minutes since the alarm had gone off. There's no way we would have got out if I didn't have the smoke alarm. It did save our lives."

Read the full story in this week's Herald.