EXCLUSIVE: Five’s Ritchie Neville reveals terrifying house fire in which he was forced to barricade himself in his bedroom and pass partner’s children out the window to safety
Ritchie Neville has recalled a terrifying house fire which saw him forced to pass his then partner’s two children out the window to safety after the family barricaded themselves in their bedroom.
The Five singer, 43, spoke exclusively to MailOnline about the ‘nightmare’ incident which ‘destroyed everything’ in the Chester property where still resides back in 2018.
Ritchie, who shares daughter Ella, now nine, with Atomic Kitten’s Natasha Hamilton said: ‘We’d all gone to bed super early around 8pm because we were done in – I can’t remember why,’.
‘It was September and basically it was a candle that had burnt down, and when we turned the lights off, you couldn’t see it was still lit’.
‘It was in a metal container and refused to go out and it made the metal red hot and while we were all sleeping it had sat and smouldered underneath for hours and hours’.
Shocking: Richie Neville, 43, has recalled a terrifying house fire which saw him forced to pass his then partner’s children out the window to safety
Family: The Five singer, 43, spoke exclusively to MailOnline about the ‘nightmare’ incident which ‘destroyed everything’ in the property in the Chester property where still resides back in 2018 (pictured as a family)
Ritchie, who’s own daughter wasn’t home during the fire, said: ‘My partner at the time had heard walking on the landing and she thought one of the girls was going to come in, but that was imaginary,’
‘But it had made her smell and she nudged me saying, “Can you smell smoke?” And the minute the air touched my nose I could smell it instantly’.
He continued: ‘It was little bit smokey in the room, and I opened the door and I couldn’t see one inch into the hallway’.
‘It was a wall of black smoke. It was really scary, so I ran through the house to get the girls down the corridor and into their room. I hadn’t a clue where the fire was, or what was going on’.
‘So we barricaded ourselves in the bedroom, and opened all the windows and did the classic [bed] quilts around the door edges and dialled 999’.
He went on: ‘In the end we started shouting for help at a neighbour yelling, “We need a ladder“, and weirdly he’d just moved in and the old man had just been clearing out some stuff which had been left behind [from the previous owner], and randomly one of the things was a ladder,
‘He literally had it on his front garden. So he grabbed it and chucked it over the wall and within seconds I was handing the kids out’.
Ritchie said that despite the home being set up with fire alarms none of them went off on the night.
Daughter: Ritchie, who own daughter daughter Ella, now nine, who he shares with Atomic Kitten’s Natasha Hamilton wasn’t at home at the time (pictured together)
Terror: Ritchie said that despite the home being set up with fire alarms none of them went off on the night
Discussing the aftermath he recalled returning to the property to find all his ‘worldly possessions had been thrown away’.
‘It was more smoke damage, and everywhere was just blackened basically. I came back a week later, and the company who check the house did their job, and when I returned the house was completely empty’.
‘I was like, “Where is all my stuff?” And they told me, “It’s all gone.” They even chucked the glass wear and I said, “Surely, that could have been cleaned?” I came back to find that all of my worldly possessions had been thrown away – apart from the Brit Award. It was definitely an experience’.
He revealed the treasured award he won with the band in 2000 survived the flames and was sent off to be properly cleaned and restored.
The single Sunshine by The 998 (Ritchie Neville and Liam Keagan) is out today.
Safe: He revealed the treasured award he won with Five in 2000 survived the flames and was sent off to be properly cleaned and restored (pictured in 1998)
