''You could call us the living dead - we feel dead inside, we don't know what we're going to do, but we're alive.''
Ian (68) and Louise (55) Wainman were left with just the clothes they were wearing and a handbag after their Tokarahi home - inland from Oamaru -was gutted by fire on Tuesday morning.
The Wainmans, who barely escaped the fire raging through the rented four-bedroom homestead on Tokarahi-Tapui Road, are trying to figure out how to start over.
''We've lost everything - all our memories from years ago - everything,'' Mr Wainman said.
''But we're here and we'll take it one step at a time. We'll live in the now and move on.
''I was watching the first bit of Dynasties ... for about 10 or 15 minutes, but of course I put the wrong element on - and there was a chip pan on it which caught fire.
''Then the whole thing was going up. I ran to get some blankets to try and smother it, but I just made it worse.''
He woke his wife and tried to save their two cats before fleeing the house.
''I said to Louise, 'Get out of there' because it's an old house and the smoke was just shooting down the corridor,'' he said.
''I went in to see if I could save our 15-year-old cat, but I couldn't get through. I got smoke inhalation and my wife got scorched a bit.''
Fire crews work to control the fire raging though the four-bedroom homestead. Photo / Supplied
One of their cats made it out alive, but they assumed 15-year-old Myst'ry died in the fire.
Wainman admits it was ''a stupid mistake'' turning on the wrong element and said it was a reminder to people to be mindful about unattended cooking.
But his wife was supportive of him and said she was just glad to have made it out alive.
''I don't blame Ian, it was a human error. I'm just glad he got me up to get outside,'' she said.
''I'm coughing a bit from the smoke, but the main thing is we're both safe, we're both OK.''
Fire crews from Duntroon, Weston, Oamaru, Kurow and the Waitaki Voluntary Rural Fire Force, St John and Kurow police were deployed to the fire shortly before 9am.
Weston Volunteer Fire Brigade Chief Fire Officer Bevan Koppert said the fire was contained and crews left the scene about 1pm.
Fire crews had initially struggled to contain the blaze because of a shortage of water.
Neighbouring residents helped fire crews locate nearby creeks from which to pump water.
Access to water was always an issue in rural fires, Koppert said.
''We ended up with about three or four water tankers there, and then they managed to source some water so that was good.''
