(Trinidad Express) It was the worst case of deja vu a mother could experience.
After she lost her ten-month-old baby in a fire at Toco in 2007, a Beetham mother faced similar tragedy yesterday, when her nine-year-old daughter, who had a disability, was killed during a fire at her home outside Port of Spain.
Police said around 1.30 p.m. a fire was reported at the Sixth Street, Beetham Gardens, home.
Killed was Aneilia Butler who lived there with her mother, security officer Makeba McIntosh, her husband Juman Ali and seven other relatives ranging in age from eight months to 70 years.
Aneilia was in the home with her stepfather, step-grandmother and two other children.
But she went into a room of the house, where fire officers said the blaze later started.
Residents said prior to the arrival of fire-fighting appliances from the Wrightson Road Fire Headquarters, they formed a bucket brigade in an attempt to douse the blaze.
When they were told a child was still inside, some tried to break a hole through a wall of the house to get to Aneilia.
Residents also praised McIntosh’s husband, who they said risked his life to rescue two other children and McIntosh’s grandmother.
He could not find Aneilia in the smoke-filled house, a resident said.
After fire officers got the blaze under control, Aneilia’s body was found.
Up to yesterday, fire officers had not determined what started the blaze.
McIntosh spoke to the Express and recalled that Aneilia had a disability, but she was a loving child who only “would do a little mischief”.
“She was a loving child but she used to do a little mischief. She had a disability, a speech (impediment), and she was mentally challenged, but she could have walked, she could have talked,” said McIntosh.
She added: “Sometimes she did not want to do her school work, but she loved to run and play with her sister, and she laughed a lot. She was really a fun-loving child.”
She explained that she shared custody of her daughter with her former partner (the child’s father), who lives in Toco.
She said she wanted to spend more time with Aneilia.
“I brought her down during Christmas in December to spend the season with me, and I let her stay with me for about two months to get her to do the school work, and then I would have taken her to her father’s place in Toco,” she said.
She said she was at work in Port of Spain when she got a call about the fire.
“They said the room she was in catch afire,” McIntosh said. “They did not know what she was doing and they could not find her at all.”
She said before she got to her home the police called her and said, “Sorry to break the news, but your daughter is dead.”
Asked how she felt about the response of the Fire Service, she said, “I think they did their best.”
McIntosh said life would not be the same following Aneilia’s death.
“I already lost one baby aged ten months, and then this come and happen,” she said.
McIntosh said in 2007 she lost her ten-month-old daughter during a house fire in Toco.
She said, “I feel very hurt right now. I don’t know what to do now because I am missing my child and I say is better God take me than her, so my life is not going to be the same.”
Beetham-Picton Councillor Akil Audain and police officers from the Victim and Witness Support Unit were at the house yesterday.
Audain said they were compiling information to administer support for the family.