Family’s home burns to ashes

A YOUNG family returned home to find their house engulfed in flames last week.

The blaze was reported to the fire brigade just before 9am last Thursday morning.

By the time fire brigade personnel arrived at the home it was well beyond saving.

The family who lived there, 27-year-old Glen Olejniczak, his 25-year-old wife Megan and their two boys Tommy and Noah – both under the age of three – were out when the fire started.

They returned home shortly after the fire brigade reached the scene, in time to see their home burn down but too late to save it.

Neighbour Des Meyer saw the scene unfold.

“She (Ms Olejniczak) broke down completely,” Mr Meyer told the Wollongong and Northern Leader.

“It was hopeless."

“Stacks of brown smoke was coming out.”

The couple were being comforted by family members after the incident, while fire crews pulled burned furniture from the gutted house and piled it on the veranda.

Three fire crews were called to the blaze, which took about 45 minutes to bring under control.

Duty Commander Ron Love from Wollongong Fire Brigade said a few items of clothing were all that was left after the fire.

“It was very intense,” he said.

“It was a good 45 minutes (before we got it out)- not that we were ever going to save anything.”

Commander Lowe was also able to confirm that the inferno was sparked by an accident involving a heater.

Neighbour Geoff Southall called Triple 0 when his son alerted him to the fire some time before 9am, but said a woman a few houses away had already called for help.

“It’s terrible because the house was renovated a couple of years ago,” Mr Southall said.

The house was located at the end of a culdesac on Hamilton Street in Fairy Meadow, not far from Mount Ousley Road.

No one was injured in the incident.

The Olejniczaks and their extended family declined to comment immediately after the fire.