Last updated 13:36, May 2 2018
PAUL MITCHELL/STUFF
Emergency services responded to a house fire at Terrace End, Palmerston North, on Tuesday night.
Emergency services responded to a house fire at Terrace End, Palmerston North, on Tuesday night.
Neighbours rushed to help a Palmerston North family whose house was on fire and they made sure everybody got out safely.
Fire trucks were on their way to the Terrace End scene just before 8.30pm on Tuesday, while neighbours were already pitching in with garden hoses as they helped get everyone out. One person suffered injuries and is now in Hutt Hospital.
Knowles St resident Gideon van Zyl and his partner were getting their two children ready for bed when he heard a cry for help.
Gideon van Zyl rushed into a house fire in Palmerston North to help rescue a family.
"It sounded urgent and scared, but I wasn't sure if I'd heard it right, so I opened the window to check."
Van Zyl heard the cry again and saw the house next door was on fire, so he rushed into the street to help.
"Most of the family and their kids were out, but one kid was still missing and another guy had gone in to get them."
Just as van Zyl headed into the smoky building, the other man found his way clear with the missing child.
"So, I decided to make a quick sweep of the house to make sure there wasn't anyone else unconscious or trapped inside."
During his search, he found a woman stuck between a fence and the house.
She couldn't get clear because the only path out was back towards the fire – so van Zyl and another neighbour helped her over the fence.
"Then, there was another small fire. Some clothes on the washing line and in a pile on the floor had caught [alight]. I didn't want it to spread, so I tried to put it out.
"It was just anything I could find. I was about to use a pot and pan, but lucky I found a garden hose."
The neighbours on the other side of the property, spraying their garden hose over the fence to dampen things down, warned him fire was still burning in a back room.
Van Zyl cracked open the window, so the neighbours could spray into the room.
"That's about when the fire service arrived," he said.
Early details about the fire from emergency services were sketchy.
Fire and Emergency NZ spokesman Murray Dunbar said three trucks from the Palmerston North fire station were sent to the property after reports of a small fire at the back of the house just before 8.20pm.
A St John spokeswoman said one person was taken from the house to Palmerston North Hospital with serious injuries.
A hospital spokesman said one person was treated at the emergency department and then transferred to Hutt Hospital.