Neighbour tells of yells from burning garage

Photo / Thinkstock

MELBOURNE - Twin boys who suffered life-threatening burns may have been playing with matches, sparking an explosion in the garage of their grandparents' Melbourne home.

Four-year-olds Omer and Abdullah Kocoglu were placed in induced comas and remain in a critical condition in the Royal Children's Hospital.

Their uncle, Muhammed Ali Kocoglu, said the boys were in the garage of the Hampton Park home, in Melbourne's southeast, when the fire started about 9pm NZT on Monday.

Witnesses saw the boys running from the garage on fire and heard them screaming like they "were being burnt alive".

One boy suffered burns to 80 per cent of his body while the other had 50 per cent burns, paramedics said.

The devastated family believe the fire started in a trailer holding furniture and that a lawnmower petrol can or a gas bottle for a barbecue may have exploded.

"I thought it would have been because they were playing with matches or something like that," Kocoglu told reporters at the scene.

The boys' father Isa tried three times to get into the garage but was forced back by the heat.

"Just out of nowhere the kids just came out themselves ... all on fire, very badly," Kocoglu said.

"We just thought that one match that [one of the boys] had in his hand he was able to spark it."

Henry Ozsoy, whose wife was driving past the house, also said the boys' grandfather had told him they believed the boys were playing with matches.

Neighbours helped hose the twins with water until paramedics arrived. Travis Graeske and his friend Michael Perry ran to help but were pushed back by the flames, before helping family members to the front lawn.

Graeske said the explosion pushed everything through the garage door and he could hear children screaming. "It sounded like they were getting burnt alive."

He said one of the boys came running screaming from the garage, his singlet melted into his skin. "He was that badly burnt I thought he had a zombie costume on ... just horrific."

Another neighbour, Salota Toma, helped soothe one of the boys while he was hosed with water.

The boys' father, who suffered burns to his hands and feet trying to get to his sons, went from Dandenong Hospital to join his wife and daughters, aged 12 and 16, at the Royal Children's.

- AAP