A WOMAN was lucky to be alive today after waking to find a bedside candle had set her quilt ablaze.

The fire gutted a bedroom and caused severe smoke damage to the rest of the first floor of the terraced house in Darnborough Street, Clementhorpe, York.

Householder Caroline Tudor explained she had the lighted candle because she never went to bed without a light and had not been able to find an extension for a lamp.

"It was a complete accident," she said. "I woke up and all I could see was the quilt on fire."

She shouted to rouse her children, Christopher, 18, and Hannah 14, and they were able to get out. Her other son, Thomas, 12, was staying with a friend.

Two appliances attended from York's Clifford Street fire station at 8.12am, and the crews used breathing apparatus and two hose jets to put the blaze out.

Station Officer Jez Rushworth said: "They had to work very hard to get into the fire because of the heat and smoke. It really was a very severe fire."

He added it was "asking for trouble" to leave any naked lights unattended, let alone going to sleep with one.

"I'm trying to stress how fortunate she is to be alive - another couple of minutes and the fumes from the burning quilt would have put her into a deeper sleep, and she wouldn't have woken up at all," he said.

There was a working smoke detector upstairs. "It's quite possible it was the smoke detector that woke her up, and it saved her life," said Station Officer Rushworth.