SHOCKED residents are counting the cost today after an early morning fire drama.Two sheds in Westbourne Road went up in flames, setting fire to rubbish and undergrowth in neighbouring allotments.

By Jessica Nicholls

SHOCKED residents are counting the cost today after an early morning fire drama.

Two sheds in Westbourne Road went up in flames, setting fire to rubbish and undergrowth in neighbouring allotments.

Householder Keith Jones said that it was a lucky escape – the flames could have taken hold of the wooden fence and bushes that lead right up to his house.

The mysterious blaze is thought to have started in his neighbour's shed at around 5am today.

He told how his 19-year-old daughter Anna, who sleeps at the back of the house had been woken up by the noise of the fire and then saw the glow of the flames.

Mr Jones, 55, said: "We phoned the fire brigade but we were about the third or fourth ones to do so because people down the road had already phoned.

"There was quite a lot of stuff in there, bikes and two lawnmowers.

"It was quite a fire – we are just lucky that it did not come this way (towards the house), if it had got hold of the bushes it could have come right up."

The flames were so severe that they burned through a fence behind the shed and set fire to rubbish and undergrowth in the Bramford Lane allotments.

Trees behind the gardens were also blackened by the blaze and the smell of burning wood still wafted around the area.

Mr Jones' neighbour, who owns the shed where the fire started, said the first thing she and her husband knew about it was when neighbours began banging on the door to wake them up.

She asked not to be named, but said: "My husband got up to let the puppy out at around 2am and there was nothing happening then."

A keen angler, all her husbands fishing equipment was in the shed ready for when the season starts in June.

She said: "He has built all the stuff up over the years, he had carbon rods and electric bite alarms – there was around £1,000 of stuff there.

"But yesterday he took his golf clubs out ready for a game today so they were saved."

Two fire crews from Princes Street and Colchester Road tackled the blaze wearing breathing apparatus.

They took around an hour to get the blaze under control and it is not yet clear what started it.