{"id":429441,"date":"2026-05-15T19:46:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T19:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/429441\/"},"modified":"2026-05-15T19:46:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T19:46:07","slug":"heart-breaking-girl-3-and-her-mother-die-in-christchurch-fire-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/429441\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Heart-breaking&#8217;: Girl, 3, and her mother die in Christchurch fire"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A 3-year-old girl and her mother have died after a fire ripped through a home in Christchurch last night.<\/p>\n<p>Five people \u2013 including four children under the age of six \u2013 were injured.<\/p>\n<p>Emergency services were called to Whitehall St in Mairehau around 8.25pm on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Sadly, a child died at the scene,&#8221; police said earlier today.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tvnz.co.nz\/player\/newsclip\/christchurch-fire-leaves-3-year-old-dead-mother-not-expected-to-survive\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Three-year-old girl and her mother killed in Christchurch house fire &#8211; Watch on TVNZ+<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;One person received critical injuries, three were in a serious to moderate condition, and two received minor injuries. The injured are two adults and four children and were all transported to hospital.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In an update on Friday evening, Detective Senior Sergeant Jo Carolan confirmed the three-year-old and \u2013 later in hospital, the mother \u2013 had died.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We can now confirm that the child who died in the house fire was a three-year-old girl,&#8221; Carolan said.<\/p>\n<p>Carolan said the children&#8217;s mother, a 23-year-old woman, who was was taken from the scene in critical condition &#8220;has now sadly died.&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The girl&#8217;s siblings \u2013 aged between 10 weeks and five years old \u2013 were also taken to hospital.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Three of the surviving children have been discharged and are in the care of family members. One child, a girl aged two years old, remains in hospital in a stable condition, with moderate injuries.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"text-greyDarkFaded\">One person is in a critical condition after blaze tore through a Mairehau home, with multiple children among the injured. (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n<p>The fire was not being treated as suspicious. <\/p>\n<p>Inquiries by police and Fire and Emergency services were ongoing, including a scene examination.<\/p>\n<p>An increased presence would remain in the Whitehall St area while inquiries continued.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is a heart-breaking tragedy for the wh\u0101nau, and police extend our deepest sympathies as they navigate this devastating time.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;Praying for them to be safe&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>St John confirmed it sent four ambulances, two rapid response vehicles and two operations managers.<\/p>\n<p>Neighbour Surendren Subashchandrabose had been at work when the fire broke out, and came home to find the road blocked. He said he was &#8220;so worried&#8221; when he found out about the blaze. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m just praying for them to be safe,&#8221; he said about the family. He described having seen them out and about and going for walks. <\/p>\n<p>Noel John Jabiguero, who also lives nearby, said he was driving home at around 9pm when he saw &#8220;heaps of police cars&#8221;. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I drove past, and I saw smoke and stuff.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>He said it was &#8220;really sad&#8221; to hear someone had died in the blaze. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t expect this to happen.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p class=\"text-greyDarkFaded\">One person is in a critical condition after a blaze tore through a Mairehau home on Thursday night, with multiple children among the injured. (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n<p>Carolan said a scene guard was put in place at the property overnight.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Police will be carrying out a scene examination today, including working with Fire and Emergency New Zealand Fire Investigators.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>She also added that the fire was not believed to be suspicious but the cause was still to be determined.<\/p>\n<p>Four fire crews responded from Christchurch, Redwood and Anzac stations responded, with the building ablaze when they arrived. <\/p>\n<p>A Fire and Emergency NZ spokesperson said crews worked to extinguish the fire, with the last crew leaving just before midnight.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 3-year-old girl and her mother have died after a fire ripped through a home in Christchurch last&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":428567,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[158,42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-429441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-christchurch-canterbury","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=429441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429441\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=429441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=429441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=429441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}