A bedridden 92-year-old woman had to be rescued by a group of workmen as fire razed her San Fernando home yesterday. The fire took place as workmen were welding on the roof of the house at Richard Street, Les Efforts. As she sat in a neighbour’s car looking at the blaze, Sidma Belgrove, muttered: “Thank God.” She was not injured.
Police said Belgrove and her 66-year-old daughter, Marjorie, were at home around 9.45 am, when the workmen told them smoke was coming from another section of the roof. They rushed into Belgrove’s room and lifted her to a neighbour’s home until emergency responders arrived. When San Fernando police, led by PC Silvan Chapman, along with Mon Repos firefighters, arrived the entire house was already engulfed in fire.
Two water tenders from the Water and Sewerage Authority were called in to supply the firetrucks with additional water while T&TEC came to disconnect the electricity supply. When approached, the disturbed Marjorie said she was too traumatised to speak. Next door neighbour, Warren Winchester, said he was home when the lights began to dim and when he looked through the window, he saw the house ablaze.
“My first reaction was fear because I thought it would have spread across here. I was worried about the old lady upstairs but the men had already removed her. “I moved my car from the yard into the road and then I took off all my breakers and I came outside with my family,” Winchester said. As the firefighters battled to extinguish the fire, the workmen looked on in concern but declined to comment on the incident. Investigators were still trying to determine the cost of the damage and the cause of the fire.