JEDDAH, 3 June 2008 — “Abdul Rahman... help me out,” were the last words that Abdul Rahman Al-Shihri heard his father utter before a fire killed him and four other family members.
Al-Shihri lost his father, his wife and three of his five children in a fire which began about midnight.
Speaking to a local daily, he said, “It was about 11 p.m. and I helped my father change clothes and eat his dinner. I turned the air conditioner on, closed the door and went to bed. I woke up later and smelled something burning. I rushed to my children’s room and got three of them out; I saw my wife with our daughter, Ahlam.”
He said he then heard his father calling for help.
“When I grabbed the knob, I felt the heat and a neighbor pulled me away before I was overcome by smoke.”
Abdul Rahman said that only a day before the fire, his father had asked to be buried in Makkah.
Civil Defense spokesman Capt. Abdullah Al-Amri told Arab News that five members of the family had died in the fire, which started in a villa in a Saudi security forces housing complex in Jeddah on Saturday.
Al-Shihri and two of his children survived and were taken to hospital while his father Muhammed, 99, his wife Sarah, 44, and his children Ali, 12, Abdul Aziz, 10, and Ahlam, 5, died in the blaze.
