A HOMEOWNER bravely roused neighbours and tackled a porch fire with buckets of water following an alleged arson attack.

Tom Potter

A HOMEOWNER bravely roused neighbours and tackled a porch fire with buckets of water following an alleged arson attack.

Stephen Canham, 46, was woken by a noise as he slept at his Bramblewood Way home, in Halesworth, yesterday morning.

When he reached his front first-floor window he saw flames licking up the side of his house and spreading to his neighbour's home.

Mr Canham quickly alerted the fire service before running to warn people living nearby about the blaze.

A man was yesterday arrested by police officers on suspicion of arson.

Mr Canham said: “I knew my next door neighbour wasn't home. But I knocked on my other neighbours' doors before pouring buckets of water from the tap at the back of my house.”

Suffolk Fire and Rescue Service got the call to attend the blaze at 1.17am.

Mr Canham tried to douse the worst of the fire before crews from Halesworth and Bungay arrived to help.

By the time firefighters had the flames under control, both he and his neighbour were left with badly-damaged porches.

“The porch has had it,” said Mr Canham. “The internal door is also damaged where the flames were starting to come into the house.”

Mr Canham, whose two daughters stay at his house fortnightly, was thankful he had been alone in the house.

“Luckily they weren't with me as they would have been sleeping in the bedroom above the porch,” he said.

Police yesterday confirmed that a man had been arrested at Halesworth police station, in the town's Norwich Road, on suspicion of arson.