Omagh Blaze Inquest Reveals Horrors

The shocking nature of a fire in which a whole family perished two years ago has been revealed.

Several rasping breaths could be heard, shortly before a desperate 999 telephone call from a blazing home ended.

The inquest into the deaths of an Omagh family killed in the fire heard the desperate pleas for help made by a teenage girl in an emergency call before she died.

Relatives wept openly in the hushed courtroom as 13–year-old Caroline McGovern repeatedly screamed "Help me" and "I'm burning ..." in the 999 call, which she made as her entire family perished in a fire believed to have been started by her father Arthur McElhill.

Arthur McElhill, 36, a convicted sex offender, his partner Lorraine McGovern, 29, and their five children, including a 10-month-old baby, died in the blaze which engulfed their home in Lammy Crescent, Omagh in November 2007.

During the call, the teenager's harrowing and sometimes incoherent pleas for help were accompanied by distant screams from other family members, amid what appeared to be the sounds of the fire.

Earlier the court was told by State pathologist Dr Jack Crane and his assistant, Dr Alistair Bentley, that all seven family members had been alive when the fire started and had died from either carbon monoxide poisoning or smoke inhalation.

Caroline died along with her brother Sean, aged seven, four-year-old Bellina, one-year-old Clodagh and 10-month-old baby James.

See: Omagh Fire Tragedy Inquest Begins

(BMcC/KMcA)