A 
family home that has served six genera-tions of the Mitchell Family is no more after a devastating fire razed it to the ground in the early hours of January 10.
Five of the large family of 15 were at home at the time of the blaze, which is believed to have been ignited by a citronella candle.
All managed to escape (some with minor injuries) however most of their possessions and the family pet, a little terrier dog, were lost in the fire.
Local emergency services responded to the 000 call for assistance just after 1am on Mon-day January 10 following the report of a house fire on the Mitchell’s property, Narwarre, 75km north east of Cobar on the Mulya Road.
Among the responders were Rural Fire Ser-vice (RFS) members from the Cobar Headquar-ters, Louth and Kerrigundi rural fire brigades with the Kerrigungi responders the closest to the fire.
A number of neighbouring property owners also attended to offer assistance.
RFS District Officer Greg Martin reports by the time help had arrived, the home, which is 120 years old, was totally engulfed by flames.
One of the family members, 27 year old Bec Mitchell, was home asleep at the time of the fire.
Bec recalls being alerted to the fire at 1am by her 20 year old brother Joe who was awakened after hearing a popping sound from outside the house.
“He immediately went to investigate and saw that the flames were originating from the out-side toilet block which was attached to the house.
“After attempting to put it out with the gar-den hose he realised the flames had cut the power and water pressure to the house.
“It was too late to try and combat it!
“He then immediately ran to wake up every-one and get them out as fast as possible.
“By the time I awoke and started running up the hallway to the front of the house, the flames had engulfed the whole northern side of the house,” Bec said.
After helping to get their family members out, including their 13 year old disabled brother Brendan, 15 year old Sammy took the quad bike to get help while Joe and Bec started mov-ing equipment away from the house. Bec said it all unfolded very quickly and it was very frightening with butane canisters, rifle rounds inside the gun safe and the air compressor starting to explode.
She said they had been able to grab a set of keys for a vehicle which they jumped into and drove down to the airstrip for safety.
Bec said sadly Joe had the job of ringing their father Richard to tell him about the fire (Richard had travelled to Dubbo for a medical appointment that was scheduled for that Mon-day morning.)
She said Sammy had been able to find help in Jack Sandford, who had been driving from Louth to Gidgee that morning, and they had grabbed the Kerrigundi fire truck.
“Jack broke open the dog runs to the south of the house yard to let them free.
“The boys and Jack quickly sorted out the fire truck to combat the gas cylinders to the southern side of the house and to stop the fire from spreading to the two fuel sheds and solar panels.
“We watched helplessly while our house collapsed to the ground at around 1.30am.
“The backup firefighter trucks and tankers from Cobar, Gidgee, Louth and Wattagoona turned up just as the Kerrigundi truck ran out of water!
A FRS fire investigator from Bourke attend-ed to examine the scene and the fire is not being treated as suspicious.
The fire crews remained on site until ap-proximately 5.30am to ensure the fire was fully extinguished.
“Jack’s mum, Clare Sandford, turned up with supplies for everyone including clothing, cool drinks, food and comfort.
“Dad turned up from Dubbo at about 6am.
“We did what we were capable of at the time and I’m proud of each of us for the role we all played in quickly saving each other and what we could before it was too late!” Bec said.
Bec said they all got out in just their night-wear and had only saved the family bible, and a small carry bag of her mum’s luggage.
“A small statue of St Joseph (the patron of families) was untouched lying in the centre of the house when we went back through the rubble,” she said.
The family is now split up and living in two small houses with relatives and will be relying on the help of family, friends, the Cobar com-munity and the generosity of strangers, to help them to recover and rebuild as their home was not insured.
“As a result of both the age of the house and multiple years of drought and hardships (especially affording Brendan’s medical needs) the house was not insured.
“The premiums on an ongoing basis were unaffordable for our family,” Bec said.
In addition to some assistance from Vinnies with clothing and essentials, among their pri-orities are replacing a raft of specialist medical equipment needed to care for Brendan includ-ing: oxygen, a suction machine, monitors, leg splints, resuscitation equipment, first aid kits, medication, incontinence linen, specialised food, books, iPad (with sensory apps) and his CD player.
Friends of the family are now in the process of raising funds via ‘Go Fund Me’ and a num-ber of local businesses are taking donations to help the family to rebuild their lives.
