The fire started around 9:50 p.m. on the second floor of a single-family house on Stephenson Street. Thick black smoke billowed as firefighters arrived. Neighbors then told them that one of the two residents had gone inside to get her cats. A mother and her 50-year-old daughter, with a mental disability, lived on site.
Firefighters found the unconscious victim on the second floor. Burned and intoxicated by the fumes, she was immediately transferred, in serious condition, to the burns center of the Queen Astrid hospital, said a spokesperson for the Brussels fire brigade.
The firefighters did not see any cats in the house. The felines probably fled themselves and got to safety somewhere. The fire, whose origin is not known, was important and the firefighters had to intervene inside and outside the house.