TWO teenagers had a lucky escape when fire ripped through an upstairs bedroom as they watched television in the lounge last night.

Thirteen-year-old Christopher Pickard and his sister, Jodie, 16, heard an explosion upstairs in the house in Canal Street, Church, at 9pm.

Their 24-year-old babysitter, Nicky Prescott, rushed upstairs to find out what the noise was and was met by flames leaping from the room.

They fled the house after calling the fire brigade from a telephone downstairs in the rented house.

Nicky said: "The news had just come on and we heard this bang. We wondered what it was at first, but as soon as I saw the flames we got out."

The bedroom and its contents were completely destroyed in the blaze and the rest of the house was smoke-logged.

The teenagers' mother, Moira Hardie, 35, who had been out of the house at the time, said: "We only moved to the house two months ago from Darwen.

"Everything in the room was destroyed. I have lost jewellery and have no clothes. We are homeless and I am going to have start looking for somewhere for us to live."

The family stayed with friends in a nearby street after the blaze.

Station officer Les Shaw, of Accrington fire station, said: "They were downstairs which is a saving grace. If someone had been in the rooms upstairs it could have been a different story.

"We found an aerosol canister upstairs which could have been responsible for the explosion."

He added that they were investigating the possibility that the blaze was started by a discarded cigarette.

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