FIREFIGHTERS searched a blazing house for a family they believed was trapped there yesterday morning, but found it empty.
A crew from Middlesbrough fire station arrived at the house in Parliament Road, in the town, to discover the living room well alight.
After being told by neighbours that a family of four lived there, they risked their safety to enter the house, wearing breathing apparatus.
Station Officer Lol McIlroy said: "We had to fight the fire as if it was a full emergency. It was a terraced house, but luckily, it had been discovered in the early stages, so didn't spread. A passer-by had attempted to get in but it was a bit beyond that stage."
SO McIlroy said the fire was being treated as suspicious. "It's being investigated at the moment," he said.
The incident is the latest in a string of suspicious fires over the past few weeks.
As reported in Tuesday's edition of The Northern Echo, there were five arson attacks in the Middlesbrough area last week.
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