A mother and her six daughters, aging from twelve years of age to two, barely made it out of their home on the corner of Chums Lane on Sunday night in Young before it was engulfed in flames.
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The fire demolished the home and the the family’s every possession other than the clothes on their backs.
Wendy Marteene said her two oldest daughters were awake with her in the lounge room when she smelt smoke, which seemed to be coming from somewhere in the house.
Wendy had only enough time to wake her other four daughters, rushing the girls hastily onto the street as the fire quickly spread.
“The first started in the joined garage, it was too big to put out so I knew we just had to get out,” Wendy said.
Emergency services were called to the scene and were able to eventually put the fire out, but nothing inside the family home could be salvaged.
“We don’t currently even have any shoes, but at least we have each other,” Wendy said.
Police are still investigating the cause of the fire, calling in forensics to go over the scene. As of yesterday afternoon police were unsure of the cause of the fire.
As news broke throughout the town of the fire and the plight of the young family, the Young community pulled together to support the family and to supply them with some much needed necessities.
The home was owned outright but the family did not have insurance and are currently relying on temporary accommodation.
Young's Donges IGA donated $1000 to the family for groceries and Judd Morris Roofing donated a $500 Best and Lest Gift Card for clothes, through the Young Witness just hours after hearing of the tragic news.
A string of donations containing brand new toiletries and bags of clothes and toys were also being donated.
One of those donations held a heart warming note from an anonymous resident, reading "Please open before throwing away." The note contained $100.
“I hate asking for things, I feel really bad, but I don’t know what else to do, we were literally left with nothing,” Wendy said yesterday afternoon.
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