A six-year-old boy’s screams alerted his father of house on fire which started at their neighbour’s house on Saturday morning.
The Kampung Kubang Semang resident would have continued sleeping, ignorant of the fire at his neighbour’s house, if it wasn’t for his son’s screams alerting him of the fire.
Mohd Nazri Abd Rahman, 35, was asleep when his eldest son Mohd Nu’man, six, started shouting which alerted him of a house on fire.
Mohd Nazri initially thought that it was just a small fire but he soon realised that he was wrong. The fire started at around 10am on the top floor of the house of the neighbour Zuraini Darus and it eventually spread to five other houses including Nazri’s.
Upon seeing the fire, Nazri panicked and quickly ran out of his rented house with his family in tow. Nazri and Nu’man escaped unharmed along with his younger son Mohd Naim, four, and a relative Nur Nadia Isa, 27.
“I just wanted to get my family out. There was no time to save anything, even the important documents,” said Nazri.
They got out just in time, before the flames spread to their house.
Fortunately, Mohd Nazri’s wife Habibah Idris, 33, who was six months pregnant, was not home at the time as she had gone for a routine check-up at a nearby clinic.
The neighbour, Zuraini, said she had just come out from her bathroom when she heard glass cracking and saw black smoke coming from upstairs.
Her daughter Muna Izzah Abdul Mutalib, 10, who was also at home with her was playing computer games when she heard her neighbours screaming for them to get out.
“My daughter and I just ran out the door,” said the 42-year-old.
Zuraini’s husband and three other children were in Kulim when the fire broke out.
Four fire trucks and 30 firemen were sent to the scene when the fire and rescue department were alerted of the fire at 10.35am.
“By the time we got there, about 90 per cent of the six houses were destroyed. It took us 20 minutes to control the fire,” said Perda fire and rescue department chief, Hadzi Mohd Yusoff.
He said that the flames spread quickly because the upper floor of each floor was made of wood.
No casualties were reported but a fireman from the Bukit Mertajam station, Hakimi Md Ali suffered breathing complications after the fire fighting operation. He was sent to Bukit Mertajam Hospital and is now in stable condition.
Source: Son screams alerted man of fire