Three generations of one family had a lucky escape from a massive house fire in Auckland overnight.
The inferno destroyed the two-storey Hillsborough home where a family of nine was living, with the cause of the blaze still unknown.
Ashna Achari planned for a quiet Friday night but was woken just before 1am on Saturday to loud screams.
"At around 12:40am-12:45am, I heard someone screaming 'get out of the house, get out of the house, get out of the house' and I could hear the children screaming," Achari told Newshub.
Flames engulfed the two-storey Hillsborough home next door to her house - terrifyingly near to where she was sleeping.
"I thought our house was going to catch on fire, it was so close," Achari said.
"I looked outside my window, which is down facing the fire and I could just see the bottom basement… flames were just coming out from the windows and then I got on the phone and called the fire brigade."
Six fire trucks took around an hour to get the ferocious blaze under control, which developed fast.
"Pretty much half the house was on fire within ten minutes, it happened so quickly," ? said.
Achari said she couldn't hear any smoke alarms from the house even though her own alarms were activated.
Incredibly, all four children and five adults made it out of the house safely, with paramedics attending to the grandparents for smoke inhalation.
Achari's house was also lucky to escape any damage.
"It's not a nice thing, a house that's been standing there since we moved here, to literally go down in flames," Achari said.
The house will likely need to be demolished as fire investigators try and work out exactly what caused the blaze.
