Everything lost in Pawarenga fire

Firefighters were powerless to save a house near Pawarenga in the early hours of Friday morning.

A North Hokianga man has lost his house and all its contents to fire in the early hours of Friday morning.

Fire crews from Kaitaia, Ahipara and Kohukohu responded just before 2am, arriving at the remote location, about a kilometre up what Senior Station Officer Ross Beddows described as a goat track off Pawarenga Road, at 2.45.

"The house was collapsing at that stage, fully engulfed in fire," he said.

"The appliances had to negotiate a narrow, wet, muddy access road to the hilltop property, and water was scarce. We initially used what was in the house tank, but that was less than 3000 litres, and didn't last long."

Crews pumped water "a considerable distance" to Kohukohu's appliance, which then pumped it up to the fire, but all the firefighters could do was drag sheets of roofing iron out of the debris to enable dampening down.

"Fifteen firefighters toiled stoically, but nothing could be saved. The fire was too far advanced when we arrived," Mr Beddows said.

The Kaitaia crew had been "pretty stuffed" by the time they left at 6am, arriving at the station at 7.15am, just in time to go to work.

The occupant of the house had been out for the evening, arriving home about 1.40am to discover it was on fire.

Fire investigator Roy Brickell said the blaze started in the kitchen area, but he was unable to pinpoint the cause with any certainty. None of the contents had been salvaged.