SYDNEY, Australia (AP) -- A mother and father died Sunday trying in vain to save one of their four children from a house fire in Australia's northwestern New South Wales state, police said.
Three children, aged 13, 10 and four, escaped the fire and walked several kilometers (miles) to a neighboring home to raise the alarm, but by the time firefighters arrived at the home their parents and a sibling had perished, a New South Wales Police spokesman said on customary condition of anonymity.
Their bodies were found later Sunday at the remote property about 700 kilometers (435 miles) northwest of Sydney.
Police did not immediately release the identities of the victims or survivors. The cause of the blaze was not immediately known.
One resident in the area, Carol Green, told Australian television's Ten Network the community was devastated by the news.
''It's just dreadful,'' she said.
