Plymouth Herald
PLYMOUTH, UK — A three-month-old baby required medical treatment for smoke inhalation after a fire at a Union Street shop.
The young baby was attended to by paramedics after he and his mother had to evacuate their home above AJ’s Second Hand Furniture Store. The fire started early yesterday morning in the front external timber facade of the shop. All three adjacent properties - including camping shop Caracamp and The Cabinet Supplies hardware store - had to be evacuated while nine firefighters from Greenbank station extinguished the flames and then used a ventilator to push out the smoke.
The baby’s mother, a young woman from Lithuania who asked not to be named, said ambulance staff had checked over her child as there had been smoke in his bedroom.
Paramedics gave him the all clear after a short check-up. Firefighters said they were called to the furniture store at 6:20 a.m. after being alerted to a shop front fire by the owners of Caracamp. Suzanne Guswell, owner of Caracamp, lives above her shop and described how she and husband Terry were woken by their fire alarm going off.
She said: “We checked our house first and couldn’t find the fire. We opened the windows but the smoke was not clearing - that is when we called the fire brigade.” The smoke has gone but still now, a few hours after the fire, our front room still smells quite pungent, as does our shop.”
Mrs Guswell explained that she had been worried for her neighbour’s baby’s health once they were all out on the street awaiting the Greenbank crews.
“I knew that I could feel the smoke in my throat so I thought it was possible his little lungs could have been affected,” she said. “His mother said there had been smoke in his room so the firefighters made the decision to call an ambulance.”
Mrs Guswell, who has worked at the store for 31 years and owned it for 16, said she thought the swathes of smoke had been funnelled into their homes above by the hollow shop frontage.
Police had initially been treating the incident as suspicious but later ruled it out. Ashley Menear, lease holder on the fire damaged building, said firefighters thought the flames could have been started by a discarded cigarette.
He said: “I got a call from the guys next door to say there had been a fire.” I don’t think police are treating it as anything suspicious. Apparently they have checked the two CCTV cameras along here and couldn’t see anything deliberate.” The firefighters said it could have just been a cigarette that’s been thrown behind the front side panel board. It’s a bit rotten behind there so it could have been that which started burning.”
Crew manager Paul Elsey at Greenbank station said the fire was small but had created a great deal of smoke which consumed the store on fire and the neighbouring buildings. One flat had to be broken into to check the occupant was not still sleeping. It turned out they had been staying elsewhere for the night. Crews finished dealing with the incident by around 7:30 a.m.
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