Man rescued after fire in a communal stairwell

Firefighters rescued a man after a fire in a communal stairwell in a block of flats in Colchester earlier today.;

On arrival, crews reported that the stairwell of a three storey block of flats was heavily smoke logged and rescued a man from inside.

Firefighters gave oxygen therapy to the man who suffered smoke inhalation and he was left in the care of the Ambulance Service.

Firefighters extinguished the fire by 4:20pm.

An investigation into the cause of the fire found it had been started deliberately.

Station Manager Danny Partridge, Incident Commander said: "Crews responded quickly to extinguish this fire and we'd like to thank the residents for their co-operation while we put this fire out."

Could you be an on-call firefighter?

Firefighters attending this incident from Brightlingsea and Wivenhoe are on-call firefighters who all live or work within 5 minutes of an on-call fire station and are paid to protect their community. If you live or work within 5 minutes of an on-call fire station, you could be an on-call firefighter. Find out more at join.essex-fire.gov.uk/on-call