Family flee flames in suspected arson

BURNED-OUT: Pogia Sione (centre) with sons Efeso (left) and Blessing at their Flaxmere home, from which they escaped after a suspected arson yesterday morning. PHOTO/PAUL TAYLOR

A Hastings mother and two sons had a miraculous escape from a suspected arson in which the woman awoke with her bedding and curtains beside her in flames early yesterday.

Pogia Sione and sons Efeso, 16, and Blessing, almost 13, were asleep in the lounge in a rear drive-way side corner of their Housing New Zealand rental home in Chatham Rd, Flaxmere, when the fire started just before 12.45am.

Mrs Sione said a flaming container was on the bed where she was sleeping and she threw it outside.

As the flames leaped up the curtains she and the boys fled through the front of the house.

Neither she nor the boys had been injured and they stood outside awaiting the arrival of the Fire Service, called from Hastings in a 111 made by the family's next-door neighbour.

Two Fire Service appliances from Hastings and one from Napier raced to the scene.

The first crew found flames engulfing the lounge and spreading into the ceiling, said Senior Station Officer Bruno Saathof, of Hastings.

Using a high-pressure hose, the firefighters were able to separate the inferno from much of the rest of the house and soon had the fire under control, Mr Saathof said.

"It's great that everyone got out, they had smoke alarms that went off," he said.

"It's now our job to ascertain the cause."

A fire investigator and police remained at the scene for the morning.

Mrs Pogia said it was 2-3pm by the time she and family were allowed back in, apart from retrieving necessary items.

At the scene later in the afternoon, after her husband Faafetai and daughter Silofai arrived home from Te Kuiti, where they had been working, Mrs Pogia told Hawke's Bay Today of the moment she awoke to find her bedding alight and flames spreading up the curtains into the ceiling.

She said she grabbed the flaming "container" and hurled it outside. "It was hot," she said.

She could not think of a reason why anyone might try to burn their home and her daughter said the only incident in the past had been the smashing of a window soon after the family moved in about two years ago. A stone apparently was thrown from an adjacent alleyway

"I have had no trouble with any of our neighbours," she said. Last night they were staying with family.

Housing NZ was understood to be investigating rehousing options.

Eastern District Police communications manager Kris McGehan said investigators "believe the fire was lit deliberately".

Police were seeking information on any suspicious activity in the area about the time of the fire.