Residents escape home gutted by suspicious fire

The fire that completely gutted a house in Levin's Morgan Crescent on Tuesday night is being treated as suspicious by fire investigation services and police.

A fire that completely gutted a house in Morgan Crescent on Tuesday night is being treated as suspicious by fire investigation services and police.

Levin fire services received the call at 8.42pm but by the time they arrived at the single-storey Levin home it was fully ablaze.

Levin volunteer fire brigade chief fire officer Lindsay Walker said the fire started in the lounge area. When fire services arrived the roof over the lounge area had already collapsed and flames were several metres high.

Two Levin fire appliances, one from Waitarere Beach and a support unit attended the fire, bringing it under control from the outside.

Next door neighbour Julian Jacobs was working that evening and knew nothing about the fire until he got home about midnight.

"It looked pretty intense but there was no damage to my house," he said.

A neighbour, who did not want to named, said the house was occupied by a man, the homeowner, and a woman who was a flatmate.

"I had the stereo going so didn't hear anything until my dog started going off. The house was already well alight by the time I looked out," she said.

The woman occupant stayed the night at her place.

Although tired and visibly upset, the woman spoke briefly to Horowhenua Chronicle to confirm she had managed to get her german shepherd Nikita out of the house safely and over the fence with the help of neighbours.

She said her two cats were still missing and her pet bird died as an indirect result of the fire. "You can't believe how much heat is generated. I got my bird out first but I can't have put it far enough away from the house and the heat killed it," she said.

The dog belonging to the male occupant was also missing.

Mr Walker said the fire was being treated as suspicious and he could not confirm if there had been working smoke alarms in the house.

He said fires spread quickly and it was important to have working smoke alarms to give occupants valuable time to get out.

Detective Sergeant Dave Wilson from Levin Police confirmed, at time of going to print, that the cause of the fire was still unknown and the investigation continuing.