I OWE MY LIFE TO THEM: Man's message to heroes who saved him from fire

Daniel Crossfield, 20, was cleaning his bedroom while his dad David, 61, and mum Glynis, 55, watched TV in the living room of their London Road home at around 5pm on Monday – unaware that a huge fire had broken out in a back room, and that thick smoke was spreading throughout their home.

David said: “We were in the living room watching the TV and for some reason it suddenly went off, so I thought the fuse had gone.

“I went out to check the fuse box and the hallway was full of smoke. I opened the back room door and the smoke just billowed out in my face and I could see flames in the corner.”

It is believed flames broke out due to an electrical fault in the family’s second-hand dryer.

David and Glynis fled the house along with their 23-year-old son, also called David, but Daniel was trapped by the smoke and took refuge near his bedroom window, where he was reassured by his family on the street below.

Daniel said: “I saw that the upstairs landing was slowly filling with smoke. Then as I was walking downstairs my dad opened the door to our back room, finding where the fire was.

“Suddenly the whole of downstairs was full of black smoke, and I was too scared to walk down into it.

“I went back to my bedroom, closed my bedroom door and put a quilt in the way in hopes of preventing smoke from getting in. I then rang the fire brigade and opened my window.

“By this point my room was in complete darkness since the electrics had all gone, with the room slowly filling with smoke.

“I quickly grabbed a T-shirt and covered my face in order to be able to breathe without inhaling too much smoke.”

David, who works as a decorator, said: “We kept shouting up, telling him the fire engines would be here any moment.

“If they hadn’t got here as quickly as they did who knows what could have happened.”

Three fire engines from Blackpool and South Shore arrived at the scene at 5.20pm, around five minutes after being called.

They used a ladder to rescue Daniel from his bedroom at the front of the house.

He was treated at the scene by paramedics and was taken to Blackpool Victoria Hospital for a check-up.

The University of South Wales student, who is currently studying to become a football coach, said: “I would like to say a massive thank you to all of the emergency services for their quick response and getting me out of the house safely.

“I owe my life to them all because I think a few more minutes and the floor beneath my feet could have caught fire and fell through.”

The family are now struggling to pick up the pieces following the fire, which gutted one room and left the rest of the house uninhabitable.

David said: “I have no idea what to do next.

“We’ll probably end up in a hostel.

“It’s a good job the TV cut out when it did. If it hadn’t we probably wouldn’t have known abut the fire for a few more minutes when the alarm started going off.

“If it had happened any later, when we were all in bed, things could have ended very differently.”

A fire service spokesman said: “When firefighters arrived at the scene, one person was still inside the property and firefighters managed to get inside the property and rescue them.

“The person rescued from the fire was taken to hospital.”