‘I heard her screaming’

Residents on Whitehall Avenue in St Andrew watched helplessly as five-year-old Kimberly Harrison perished yesterday in a fire at her home.

“I heard her calling for help and screaming,” said distraught relative John Tamasa, who had helped to rescue the child’s grandmother and a male on a crutch from the burning building.

“I couldn’t do anything more because if I went in there to help, myself would be knocked out because the smoke that was coming out of the house no one could survive that,” he added dejectedly as the child’s mother wailed in the background.

Tamasa, who also lived in the house, said he was driving out of the lane when he saw the black smoke and ran back inside to help the two older folks.

According to him, he could not get to the child because of the blazing fire and the thick smoke.

Kimberly and the two adults were inside the three-bedroom dwelling when the fire started. The child’s mother and her sibling, who also lived at the premises, were not present when the tragedy struck.

The distraught mother, who could only muster her first name, “Shelly”, was too overcome with grief to speak to the media.

She cried uncontrollably.

The mother had reportedly left the child with the grandmother to go on the road.

Superintendent Courtney Thompson of the York Park Fire Station said the call came in at approximately 2:53 p.m. and a fire unit from the Half-Way-Tree Fire Station responded.

However, he said when the team arrived, the house was already completely engulfed in flames.

Thompson further shared that while the firemen were conducting cooling-down exercises, they were advised that a child may have been in the house. A search was carried out, and the body of the five-year-old was found in the bathroom.

In the meantime, Thompson said an investigation is being done to determine the cause of the fire.

The building is estimated to have cost $10 million.

tanesha.mundle@gleanerjm.com