Dad Ian Kendrick, who had been asleep on the sofa, was woken up by a smoke detector in the early hours of Thursday morning. But flames had already taken a strong hold of the house on Cotebrook Road.

He yelled upstairs to his sleeping sons and led Dean, 13, and Scott, 10, outside to safety - not realising that Pepsie, his Jack Russell terrier, was trapped inside.

Neighbour and friend Tracey Shillito said: "It was terrible.

"Dean ran over here at about 2am saying that the house was on fire.

"I had a friend here, Jay Calladine, who went over to help. The kids were screaming at their Dad to get out - he'd gone back inside to find Pepsie.

"So Jay went in the back door and saw the dog on the kitchen floor. He tried to crawl by the flames, thinking Ian had collapsed next to Pepsie, but thankfully he'd already got out.

"The windows were blowing out of the house and everything.

"The family is devastated - Ian and the lads have only got the T-shirts and boxer shorts they were sleeping in. They've lost everything.

"And they'd had Pepsie for years. He went everywhere with Ian."

Firefighter sub officer Eric Davies said: "The fire started from a candle in the living room - the family had no lighting because they'd run out of cards for their electricity meter.

"It spread quickly because no doors were closed inside the house.

"But they are very lucky - if they hadn't had a smoke detector the whole family could be dead."

It could be five months before Ian and his sons are given another council house to live in. Neighbours have had street collection for them to buy some clothes - if you can contribute or have any furniture to help them set up a new home ring Tracey on 01606 351265.

Converted for the new archive on 13 March 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.