FOUR children died in a house inferno yesterday as they screamed helplessly for their parents.
Neighbours heard the terrified children cry out "Mummy, Daddy, help us, please" as flames tore through the house in Sullivan Road, Southampton, after a suspected arson attack. But minutes later their screams ceased.
A neighbour, Mr John Clifford, said: "The sound of those helpless little kids screaming for their lives will stay with me forever."
Patrick Good (6), his brother Terry (12), and their sisters Nicola (8) and Alison (10), died in the blaze. A fifth child, Kelly (14), survived the fire but suffered serious burns.
Their father, Mr Melvyn Good, a building worker, and their mother, Mrs Bev Good, escaped by jumping on to a conservatory roof and wept uncontrollably as they realised all four children had died. They told neighbours petrol had been poured through their letter box and set alight.
Mr Clifford said that as the children screamed from an upstairs bedroom "the house was completely ablaze. But even above the noise of the fire I could hear those children's screams."
Ms Melanie Gregory (25) quoted Mrs Good as shouting: "My kids, my kids, I can't save my kids... Then she said, `Someone's poured petrol through the letter box and set fire to it'."
Some fire officers were so traumatised they needed on the spot counselling. Hampshire police are treating the fire as suspicious.