POLICE today hailed a quick-thinking rescuer a hero after he alerted residents to a fierce blaze consuming their building before helping to catch a woman as she leapt to safety.

Grant Sherlock

POLICE today hailed a quick-thinking rescuer a hero after he alerted residents to a fierce blaze consuming their building before helping to catch a woman as she leapt to safety.

The man has been credited with saving the lives of at least two people trapped inside the blazing block of flats in Trimley St Martin after the fire broke out early today.

Suffolk police said he raised the alarm after he spotted the fire spreading through the block of six flats in Jasmine Close just before 12.15am.

After alerting the fire brigade, he was able to wake a 20-year-old woman inside one of the first floor flats by shouting from outside and then caught her after she was forced to jump from a first-floor window.

Firefighters from Felixstowe and Ipswich were called to fight the blaze in the stairwell and landing of the building, which is made up of six flats.

A spokesman for the Suffolk Fire and Rescue Service said when they arrived they found the first floor “heavily involved in fire”.

Suffolk police said that it had launched an investigation into the cause of the blaze and was treating it as arson with intent to endanger life.

It is thought the fire began when a settee or chair in the stairwell was set alight.

As well as rescuing a second person from the first floor, firefighters forced their way into a third flat but found it was not occupied.

The fire was under control by 1.20am.

The three first floor flats suffered extensive smoke damage, with the repair bill estimated at about £20,000.

The ground floor flats were not damaged and the residents of those flats were allowed to return to their homes after the fire was extinguished.