NEIGHBOURS have described the “terror” of a fire which destroyed the ground floor of a house in Edgware yesterday.

Twenty firefighters battled to put out the blaze in Barnfield Road early yesterday morning, with a 54-year-old man who escaped the burning building being taken to hospital with burns and smoke inhalation.

Francesco Giamborressi, who lives next door to the two-storey terraced house, was woken just past midnight by screams.

He said: “There was lots of smoke coming into the house and I rushed to get my wife and son out into the garden.

“I could see the flames and I tried to put out the fire with a bucket of water but it was no use. There was smoke billowing from the building - it was terrifying.”

The couple were full of praise for firefighters who were on the scene in minutes, bringing the fire which gutted the ground floor under control within an hour.

Mr Giamboressi, a bus driver, added: “They were brilliant. If they hadn't have got here so quickly somebody could have died.”

His wife Janetta said the experience had been extremely traumatic. She said: “I was so scared. I'm not sleeping, I'm crying, I can't stop thinking about it.”

Another neighbour, who did not wish to be named, said that she had heard shouting but thought nothing of it and got into bed.

But she said: “Then I saw and smelt the smoke coming into the house and panicked. I looked out and saw lots of smoke coming out of the building.

“Thank God nobody was seriously hurt.”

The cause of the fire is still under investigation by the London Fire Brigade.