Three-year-old girl rescued as two siblings killed in Gachie apartment fire

Three men are being hailed as heroes in Gachie after risking their lives to rescue a three-year-old girl from a fourth-floor apartment engulfed by flames.

But the daring rescue ended in heartbreak, as the fire claimed the lives of the girl’s two siblings, who were trapped inside.

Police are investigating reports that the children had been locked inside the house while their mother was away.

Their grieving father, Kennedy Njau, is now demanding answers, calling for a thorough investigation as he attended the postmortem examination of his two children at the Nairobi Funeral Home.

Mobile phone footage captured in Gachie last Saturday shows a man battling intense heat and thick smoke as flames engulf a fourth-floor apartment.

Clinging to his hand is a three-year-old girl. Moments later, he carefully lowers her to the third floor, where two other men stand ready to catch her. They rush her to hospital, where she receives first aid.

The daring rescue unfolds at around 5pm, after children playing nearby spotted smoke billowing from a house where three of their friends were trapped inside.

One of the rescuers, Joash Ondieki, says: "I did not want to fail that child…and I did not want to fail that child who was staring at us asking ‘please help, please help.’ I had to do it,”

The men rushed to the apartment, forcing open the gate and racing upstairs, where they found the little girl stranded on the balcony, with flames closing in.

Another rescuer, Kevin Bahati, stated: “Nikaambia Juma usichoke kushika mtoto, mtupe hapa chini penye tuko, hapa number tatu…tukamwambia shukia hapa huezi rudi pale ile pipe ni kidogo…aliporudi nikamwambia tufanye vipi, tukachukua curtain tukafunga mtoto tukavunja mlango tukatoka.”

Tragically, the rescuers could not reach the girl’s two siblings, Tehilla Wambui and Angela Njeri, who failed to make it to the balcony as flames engulfed the house. Both perished in the inferno, their bodies later transferred to Nairobi Funeral Home.

The children’s father, Kennedy Njau, said: "Mama mwenyewe alisema alifungia watoto kwa nyumba…after kufungia watoto kwa nyumba akaenda akiexpect kuna msichana wa kazi atakuja, ati hajui kwenye moto ilitoka.”

Njau says he and the children’s mother shared parenting responsibilities, with the children in her care over the weekend.

Now grappling with unanswered questions, he is urging detectives at Kihara Police Station in Kiambaa to conduct a thorough investigation and deliver justice for his children.

"Anyone mwenye anaweza anisaidie to get to know the cause of the fire…na hii story isiende like any other story, it should not be like any other story, two innocent lives, mtoto hata mmoja hajaweza kutembea vizuri,” he said.

A postmortem established carbon monoxide poisoning as the cause of death. The family is now preparing to bury the two children as police investigations continue.