Three Women Killed in Texas House Fire

July 12, 2013
One victim helped three children escape, but died trying to help her elderly mother and aunt.

July 12--Three Fort Bend County women died in a fire on Thursday, including one who had helped three children escape but returned to the burning home to help her bedridden mother and aunt, officials and a neighbor said.

The fire, which broke out about 11:45 a.m., gutted the house in the 9900 block of Johnson between Orchard and Simonton in rural Fort Bend County.

Authorities said three children -- boys, 17 and 5, and a 10-year-old girl -- got out of the home just in time.

"They are safe," said Bob Haenel, a spokesman with the Fort Bend County Sheriff's Office.

Haenel did not have identities of the three women but said they were related.

One was in her 90s, another in her 80s and the third in her 50s, he said.

A neighbor said one of the women, identified by her as Joyce, helped the children escape but then went back inside to assist her mother and her aunt, women with health problems.

"They were both bedridden," said the neighbor, Gloria Long.

"I guess she got overcome by the smoke and the flames," she said.

Long said the woman had given up her job as a licensed vocational nurse about six years ago to take care of her ailing mother and aunt.

"That says a lot about someone. You don't see people who do that every day," Long said.

Long said the three who escaped were Joyce's son and grandchildren.

Long said the woman was devoted to the two elderly women who also lived in the house.

"If she went somewhere, she would take them with her," Long said.

Firefighters from several agencies responded to the blaze at the brick and wood frame home.

Because the home is in an isolated area, firefighters had to contend with a lack of water lines in the area.

"We had to rely on pumper trucks from a number of agencies," Haenel said.

"They all brought tankers so they could ship water to the site."

No cause had been determined by late Thursday.

The Fort Bend County Fire Marshal's Office is investigating.

Copyright 2013 - Houston Chronicle

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