Computer blamed for house fire

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QUICK-THINKING grandmother saved her two young granddaughters when a fire broke out in an upstairs bedroom.

Denise Mayoh was making a cup of tea when she heard the fire alarm go off in her house in Dyson Street, Farnworth, at around 11am on Saturday.

She was babysitting her granddaughters, Chloe and Coadie Corkhill, aged three and two.

Coadie was with her in the kitchen, but Chloe was in the upstairs bathroom.

Mrs Mayoh, who is registered disabled and normally has to use a stairlift, got herself up the stairs as fast as she could and saw that the computer table in the front bedroom was on fire and the blaze was quickly spreading.

She grabbed Chloe from the bathroom, went downstairs and took both grandchildren out of the house to the back garden.
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The blaze destroyed the contents of the bedroom, including the ceiling, floors and window, and had started spreading to the bathroom next door when fire crews arrived.

Smoke from the blaze seriously damaged the rest of the house and its contents.

Mrs Mayoh said: "If I had thought and closed the door then it would have probably saved a lot of my things, but I just wanted to get the kids out.

"At the end of the day, I may have nothing left upstairs but at least my grandchildren are safe and nobody got hurt. That's the only thing that matters to me."

Firefighters are not sure how the fire started but have logged it as being due to a child playing with a lighter.

However, this is only a probable cause and an electrical fault with the computer could have also caused the blaze.

Mrs Mayoh, aged 47, said: "It was definitely the computer. It was not a lighter.

"It started in the corner with the computer. I had only recently plugged it in for the kids to play games on.

"The top and middle shelf where the computer and TV are kept were burnt out."

I trust the grandmother on this one. Just a guess, but I bet there was cat hair clogging the power supply fan, causing overheating that would have been prevented by a smoke shutoff power strip.