York family’s blaze horror

Mother-of-two Ellen Humble has hit out after arsonists started the blaze at her home in Tennyson Avenue, Clifton.

She said her shed, a three-wheeled car which was parked in the garden and nearby fencing were all destroyed in the fire.

Every window at the back of her house cracked in the heat from the blaze - but, fortunately, the family's pet guinea pig had a lucky escape.

The Press told how firefighters were called to the house after youths set fire to rubbish in a back garden at about 9pm, on Saturday, April 14.

They managed to get the blaze under control by about 9.40pm.

Ellen, 35, said her teenage daughter, Emma, had been in the house when the fire started.

"I wasn't at home when it happened, but my daughter was and she was petrified," she said.

"I got home just as the fire service finished putting it out.

"It started when somebody set the shed on fire, but then it spread to the car and everything else went up as well."

She said the car was insured, but nothing else was.

She lost a pine table, a video, and a TV, which she had been storing in the shed, in the blaze.

"I'm absolutely gutted," she said.

"Luckily, I'd brought my guinea pig, Spot, in that night or it could have been even worse."

Ellen said she had now been told she will have to clean up the mess at her council property herself.

Almost three weeks after the blaze, she is still waiting to have her windows fixed.

She said: "It's such a mess I just don't know where to start.

"I'm an asthmatic and this wasn't my fault, but I'm the one being made to suffer.

"I've been waiting more than two weeks now for somebody to come and do the windows, but nobody has been in touch with me."

The car has now been removed, but the rest of the blackened aftermath is still in the garden.

A City of York Council spokeswoman said: "The council will certainly repair or replace any items that have been damaged by the fire and that are the council's responsibility."