Latoya Meyers tried unsuccessfully to hold back the tears as she recounted the last moments she spent trying to rescue her six-year-old autistic child and her four other children. Six-year-old Kriston Meyers, who was diagnosed with spina bifida, a spinal disorder at birth, died of soot and smoke inhalation after his Moolchan Street, Guaico Tamana, Sangre Grande, home caught afire around 3.15 am yesterday.
The fire has so far been attributed to faulty electrical wiring. The mother of five—Chelsea, nine; Christopher, eight; Kriston; Kadel, two; and Amelia, one—said she was asleep with her youngest child when she smelled sponge burning and heard a crackling noise. “I get up and went to check and when I went outside I see smoke. So I went back (in the bedroom) and scream for everybody to get out and I grab the baby and carry her outside because that was the youngest.
She added that she woke up Kriston and his older brother Christopher. She said she told Christopher to hold his brother’s hand as she guided them both out of danger. “He said ‘Mommy I frighten’ and I tell him hold his brother hand.” “But like when I was pulling him he let go of his brother and we didn’t realise. Fire officers said they discovered the boy's body on the lower part of a double decker bed.