Authorities identify four people killed in Queensland house fire

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A warning this next story contains the names and images of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who have died and are used with the permission of their family. Investigators are yet to determine what caused the deadly house fire in central Queensland that claimed the lives of four people including two babies. The incident has left the Emerald community in shock.

Transcript

00:00Growing tributes in memory of four lives lost, Thursday's early morning fire destroying this

00:08Emerald duplex and devastating two families and the wider community. Brother and sister Desmond

00:15and Madison Simmons aged five months and 20 months respectively, a 15-year-old girl and

00:21family friend 36-year-old Matthew Chile died. I think it's hit the community pretty hard.

00:27Like I said, we're pretty strong here. We know everyone. There's not many people that we don't know.

00:33A 25-year-old woman and 38-year-old woman, both from Emerald, escaped the blaze. The local church

00:40opening its doors. We lit four candles for the four who passed away. And for a community in mourning.

00:49To pray or even to pray with someone or to talk to someone, yeah, just to be available.

00:54Investigators back at the scene for a second day.

00:58Our forensic and scientific teams are there currently now examining the scenes and it's

01:02just too early to tell what the cause was. As investigations continue, police are appealing

01:06for anyone who may have been in the area at the time of the fire or has CCTV footage to contact

01:12authorities. So we're still trying to ascertain when the fire actually occurred. We have got reports of

01:17smoke coming from the unit. However, we do want to piece together a timeline to actually understand

01:22when the fire actually occurred. Police say the fire is not being treated as suspicious.

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