A 16-month-old baby girl is recovering from smoke inhalation after a miracle escape from a flat fire.

Station officer Martin Powell, of Basildon fire station, said baby Alexandra Richardson, her 24-year-old mother, Nicola Richardson, and 22-year-old father, Jonathan White, were lucky to be alive.

They had taken the battery out of their smoke detector, but woke up just in time to get out of the blaze, which gutted the flat in Fairfax Avenue, Pitsea, in the early hours yesterday.

Fire investigators were today trying to uncover the cause of the fire, but it is not being treated as suspicious.

Two fire crews from Basildon station were called to the blaze at around 3.30am and two officers in breathing apparatus helped put it out.

Little Alexandra was taken to Basildon Hospital suffering from smoke inhalation after the blaze, but was released after treatment.

Mr Powell urged families in Basildon to put batteries in their smoke alarms as it can save lives.

He said: "We have a family that are very lucky to be alive today. They had removed the battery from their smoke detector.

"The fire started in the early hours of the morning when the family were asleep. I do not know how they woke up or got out, but they should have been dead today."

Jonathan's sister, Mandy, said: "I wanted to cry when I heard what had happened. They have nowhere to live now and no clothes with Christmas coming up."

Mandy, 24, of London Road, Hadleigh, added: "They are so lucky to be alive. Nicola woke up and smelt the smoke. A fireman told them that if they had been in the flat for another five minutes they would not have been alive."

Smoked out - blackened windows at the family's flat

Picture: MAXINE CLARKE

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