A mother and her four children have died after fire swept through their home in Okochiri community, Okrika Local Government Area of Rivers State, in the early hours of Friday.
The blaze claimed all five lives before emergency responders could fully intervene, and left the community mourning another fatal domestic fire incident.
Youths in the community reportedly battled the flames and succeeded in putting them out before the police arrived at the scene.
Initial accounts from residents suggested that petrol may have triggered the inferno after a spark ignited it. However, the cause had not been independently established as of the time of filing the report.
The Senior Commander of the Civilian Joint Task Force in Okrika, Igwe Godswill, confirmed the deaths in a telephone interview with Channels Television.
Godswill said details surrounding the incident were still unclear when community members arrived at the scene.
“We just heard the news this morning about the fire. There are no proper details about what happened, but when we got there this morning, we saw that about four children had been burnt to death and the wife, a total of five persons,” he said.
He said the police had already reached the location and gathered information about the incident.
“But the police had already arrived and taken proper details of what happened. It is so disheartening that this is happening again in our community,” Godswill added.
According to him, the fire had been extinguished before he and other community members reached the residence.
“When we got there this morning, the fire had been put out, and the police had already come to the scene. I believe a proper investigation will be carried out,” he said.
Godswill disclosed that the case had been transferred to the police at the Okrika Police Station for further investigation.
The spokesperson for the Rivers State Police Command, Blessing Agabe, also confirmed the incident in a conversation with Channels Television.
The circumstances surrounding the deaths are yet to be fully established. In particular, authorities have not confirmed the reported claim that petrol and a spark triggered the fire.
The incident has once again drawn attention to the devastating consequences of residential fires, particularly when they occur at night, when occupants may have little time to escape.
In Okochiri, the immediate response came from community youths who worked to suppress the flames before the police arrived. Their intervention helped to bring the fire under control, but the five occupants had already lost their lives.
The tragedy has left a family wiped out in a single incident, while the police begin the task of determining how the fire started and what happened inside the residence before it was extinguished.
Authorities are expected to establish the exact circumstances of the blaze as the investigation progresses.
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