Two young children died in a house fire in the municipality of Puurs-Sint-Amands, in the Flemish province of Antwerp, on Sunday evening, De Standaard reports. The cause of the fire is still unknown.
Two children, aged four and eight, died as a result of the fire. Their 37-year-old mother is seriously injured. One local resident was also injured; the man attempted to help but fell and was also taken to hospital.
The fire broke out just before 23:30 while the mother and her two children were home. Emergency services arrived on the scene just five minutes after the call.
“We were confronted with a raging fire at the rear. We found the mother in the garden of the house and it quickly became clear that there were still two children in the house,” said Danny Geernaert from the Rivierenland fire zone. “We entered the house from the front and back. At the rear we placed a ladder against the facade and smashed a window.”
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One child was rescued quickly while a second was able to be rescued “a little later.” Two emergency response vehicles and several ambulances tended to the patients on the scene. The children were transferred to the Stuivenberg Hospital in Antwerp, where they died.
A forensic lab, police detectives, and fire experts descended on the scene to investigate the cause of the fire.
The exact cause of the fire is still unknown. “The fire raged very fiercely, especially on the ground floor,” Geernaert said. “The blaze and smoke quickly spread to the top floor. But what caused the fire will be further investigated.”
