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Published: Wednesday December 22, 2010 MYT 9:31:00 AM
Updated: Wednesday December 22, 2010 MYT 3:00:50 PM
Four in family die in fire (Updated)
BY ANN TAN and WINNIE YEOH
GEORGE TOWN: Four family members perished in a fire that razed a double-storey shophouse in Perak Road, Jelutong at about 2.40am Wednesday.
Firemen carrying out investigations inside the shophouse after the fire
Shop owner Neoh Hooi Poh, 57, managed to escape in the nick of time but his wife Goeh Siew Keow, 56, daughter Li Hong, 18, and son Soo Aik, 16, died in the incident.
His mother Lim Chye Hwa, 73, fainted and died on the way to the Penang Hospital.Neoh, who sells prayer paraphernalia, said his son woke him up to inform him about the fire and he hurried down to find the keys to open the front door.
"We were all sleeping upstairs. I couldn't find the keys and started crying for help from the back door."The firemen came to help open the back door and I thought my son would bring the rest of the family members down to safety.
"It turned out he only managed to bring down my mother, who had difficulty in walking," he told newsmen at the scene.He said he believed his son had then gone back to save the others.
His son, daughter and wife were found burnt to death in a toilet upstairs. He is only left with his eldest child Celine, 29, who lives elsewhere.
Penang Fire and Rescue Department deputy director (Operations) Mohd Razam Taja Rahim said 35 firemen in five fire engines and four voluntary fire-fighting teams rushed to douse the fire after they received the call at 2.50am.
We took a while to bring the bodies down as the staircase was made of wood and we were afraid that it would collapse anytime.
"The shophouse was piled with prayer items and that made rescue work more difficult, especially since it was dark inside," he said, adding they managed to control the fire within 15 minutes.
He said the cause of the fire was being investigated and the losses had yet to be determined.
GEORGE TOWN: After more than 40 years in the business of selling prayer items, a grief-striken Neoh Hooi Poh is giving it all up – the death of his loved ones in a fire on the day the family observed the Chinese Winter Solstice Festival was too painful to bear.
“I will quit the business after settling the funeral services of my loved ones.“I find their deaths too much to bear.
I have had enough of this business I have been involved in since I was 13,” he said, when met at the wake of his four family members in Jalan Van Praagh here yesterday.
Neoh
Neoh, 57, escaped the fire that razed the family’s two-storey shophouse in Jalan Perak here in the 2.40am incident.
His wife, Geoh Siew Keow, 56, daughter Li Hong, 18, and son Soo Aik, 16, died in the blaze while his mother, Lim Chye Hwa, 73, died while being rushed to the Penang Hospital.
Onlookers were moved by the sight of a bowl of glutinous rice balls placed next to several joss sticks outside the shophouse, a sign that the family had earlier conducted prayers to mark the festival.
Neoh said he and another daughter, Celine, 29, will move to his father’s house in Sungai Nibong. “She is the only child left,” he sobbed.
Recalling the tragedy, he said he kept telling the firemen there were people on the upper floor of the house.
“I shouted until my voice turned hoarse but none of my family members were saved,” he said.
The coffins bearing the bodies of Neoh’s mother, daughter, wife and son lined up at the wake of the four at Jalan Van Praagh
Neoh’s wife and his two dead children will be cremated at the Batu Gantong crematorium on Sunday. Lim’s body will be buried in Teluk Bahang.
Meanwhile, Neoh’s brother, Hooi Chin, 46, lodged a report at the Patani Road police station at about 3pm yesterday, claiming that some of the family’s belongings and valuables had gone missing.
State Fire and Rescue Department director Ahmad Izram Osman said the double-reinforced front door of the shophouse made it difficult for his men to cut through.
He said there was a roller shutter and a collapsible grill.Ahmad Izram said his men went to the back door to cut it and managed to break the front door after that.
He said the station received a distress call at 2.50am and arrived a minute later at the scene, less than 50m away.
