Three children, aged three, five and six, were killed in a fire that broke out Thursday night in their apartment in the Kilo 6 neighborhood in the south of Jeddah.

According to Col. Saeed Sarham, spokesman for the Civil Defense in Makkah, the operation room in Jeddah received a call Thursday about a fire and thick smoke coming out of a building in the Kilo 6 neighborhood. Fire rescue teams and personnel were immediately dispatched to the scene to extinguish the fire, he said.

He said the three children were evacuated from the building. “All of them were suffering from extreme suffocation from smoke, and were immediately transported to the Al-Ahly Hospital by Red Crescent ambulances. They were later declared dead,” said Sarham.

The rescue teams successfully put out the blaze which had engulfed the apartment on the third floor of the three-story building.

The children, of Yemeni origin, were alone in the apartment when the fire broke out.

Col. Gazi Al-Ghamdi, director of operations at the Civil Defense, said investigations are under way to determine the cause of the fire.