Stubbs family open up about Christmas house fire tragedy in Andergrove

A teary Queensland mum has recounted her family’s frightening escape from a fire which destroyed their home and the outpouring of Christmas kindness that’s followed. VIDEO, PHOTOS.

It was a night like any other.

Shardae Stubbs was playing with her son Fletcher at her home at Andergrove in the Mackay region.

Within minutes, she, her husband Marcus and their children were fleeing for their lives.

“My son said, ‘Mum, I smell smoke’,” she recalled.

“And I just looked out my front door and I could see black smoke.”

Her bedroom on the top floor of her two-storey house was soon engulfed in flames.

“I ran to the bedroom and I opened the door and it was black,” she said.

“The bed was on fire, the curtains were on fire, the ceiling, and I just grabbed my kids and ran.

“Thirty seconds later and my daughter would have been trapped in her room.”

The Stubbs family together at Erakala on December 22, 2022 after their house on 6 Annmore St in Andergrove burned down on December 19, 2022. Picture: Duncan Evans

Marcus had just arrived home and together they fled with Fletcher, 4, and Sophee, 7, leaving everything behind.

Speaking just three days after the fire, Shardae said her children’s safety was her only thought in that rushed moment.

“I just knew I had to get my kids out of the house,” she said.

“I just didn’t think it was real, it happened so fast.

“As we were running down the stairs, the window of the bedroom just exploded.”

The aftermath of the house fire at 6 Annmore St in Andergrove. Picture: Duncan Evans

The Christmas tree “melted” but incredibly, the firefighters rescued some of the presents and carried them out for the family.

Shardae is emotional when she speaks about the firefighters who were there that day.

“They made my kids smile,” she said.

“They made us feel OK.

“Like ‘it’s not your fault, it’s no-one’s fault’.

“One of them saw that my daughter was distressed and he just came over and gave her a huge pile of stickers.

“And it just made her day.

“And she wants to be a firefighter.

“Firefighters are everything to our family already.”

QFES Inspector Russell Collier attended the scene of the fire at 6 Annmore St in Andergrove on December 19, 2022. Here he sits at the Mackay Fire Station on December 22, 2022. Picture: Duncan Evans

Queensland Fire and Emergency Inspector Russell Collier attended the scene of what he called an “intense fire”.

“Fire crews basically attacked the fire from the ground first and then they made entry up inside,” he said.

“The reports are it was extremely hot in that particular part of the building.

“The smoke and heat had travelled through the building.

“They then progressed to the bedroom and extinguished that fire.”

The firefighters kept the blaze suppressed to the bedroom, but the smoke and heat has wrecked the building, owned by the couple’s parents, and the Stubbs’ lost most of their possessions.

Marcus is a carpenter and works on a casual contract so the single- family does not have money flowing in over the Christmas period.

Fire, smoke and heat damage has decimated the Stubbs home at 6 Annmore St in Andergrove. Picture: Contributed

Shardae said the days that followed were hard on everyone.

“My son was up having nightmares all that first night, crying for me” she said.

“My daughter had her moments because she lost all her stuff. All her barbies and her dolls.”

The Stubbs have since relocated to Erakala to live with family and both Marcus and Shardae are in awe of the kindness and love their friends, family and neighbours have shown to them since the tragedy.

“I have no words for how kind people have been,” Shardae said through tears.

“I don’t know where the kindness comes from but it came out of everyone around us.”

Marcus said the family had a place to stay within hours of the fire.

Her friend Casey Fitzgerald has started a GoFundMe to help the family rebuild for 2023.

The Stubbs family together at Erakala on December 22, 2022 after their house on 6 Annmore St in Andergrove burned down on December 19, 2022. Picture: Duncan Evans

The page shows a target goal of $4000 and in just one day, the campaign has raised $1560.

“I couldn’t ask for a better friend,” Shardae said, adding she still felt grateful this Christmas, despite the traumatic week.

“I’m grateful that we are alive,” she said.

“That is it, my family.

“It has put it into perspective, what is important.

“All our Christmas presents didn’t get burned.

“They got saved.”