True spirit of the people...
Reporter: Lewis Jones
Date published: 15 August 2011
Friends, stores, firms, rally to help family after fire leaves them with nothing
A bride-to-be says she is “truly overwhelmed” by the response from the community after a devastating fire tore through her home.
Karen Eckersley and 15-year-old son Josh were forced to leap from the bathroom window at their home in Moor Street, Shaw, after a faulty dryer sparked an inferno downstairs.
The pair were left with the only the clothes they were standing in. Yet days later generous businesses came out in force, offering her a raft of donations to help her get back on her feet.
Recalling the nightmare, Karen (32) said: “It was awful, a noise woke me up and it looked all grey, I opened the bedroom door and smoke just bellowed in.
“I screamed forJosh and we had to jump out of the bathroom on to the porch.
“Just as we got to safety the whole window collapsed from the wall, if I hadn’t of woke up when I did we probably wouldn’t have been here, it was just terrifying.
“The whole street was traumatised, we were crying and neighbours were too.”
Sadly the much-loved family dog Buster, a Staffordshire bull terrier they got from a rescue home, died in the fire.
Shock rippled through the neighbourhood as the mum, who is due to get married next month, returned to the house the following day to assess the damage.
Walls had been exposed to their bricks and the conservatory had collapsed. Boxes of mementoes had been destroyed and their clothes were black and smoke-ridden.
But while Karen made trips to the tip the throw out all of their charred possessions, friend Lynsey Tetlow sprung into action and approached local businesses in a bid to get the family’s lives back on track.
Asda in Shaw have handed over £100 in vouchers while generous bosses at Matalan in Rochdale have offered her a £200 spend in the store.
Kind-hearted owners at Bescoby’s jewellers in Shaw is providing free wedding rings while Panda Print has donated wedding invitations to replace those lost in the fire.
Staggeringly, Chris Hollingworth, a family friend who lives in Australia, saw the online report from the Oldham Chronicle and contacted Karen to donate £,1000 worth of Argos vouchers for her to replace their belongings.
Karen said: “I am just so overwhelmed, I can’t put into words how kind everyone in the community, from friends and family to strangers have been.
“Neighbours have given us bags of clothes, I even went in to the local shop round the corner from the house and the owner gave me £100, I felt like crying I was so moved by it all.”
Interiors in Shaw is donating a quilt covers and pillows.
Lancashire Wallpapers has offered Karen credit to spend when the time comes to redecorating, even though she says it us unlikely they will move back into the house.
Karen, who has moved with her son to her mum’s house in Shaw, had disconnected the smoke alarm just days before the flames ignited.
Now she is warning others to be on the guard.
She said: “There was something wrong with our alarm, it would sound at all hours and we couldn’t turn it off when it did.
“Now I wouldn’t sleep in a house without one, people need to have their escape plan in place. Nobody should have to go through what we did.”
A benefit party has been arranged at the Duke of York in Shaw on Sunday August 21 from 2pm.
