The panicked father of three girls who died with their mother in a horror house blaze struggled to tell anyone his daughters were still in the house until firefighters arrived because he was too distraught, according to neighbours.
Emergency crews rushed to the townhouse on Tulloch Grove in Glen Waverley in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs at about 1.40am on Sunday after the property’s garage caught alight.
Kaoru Okano and her three girls – aged three, five, and seven – had tried in vain to take cover from the blaze in the en suite bathroom as the suburban home became engulfed in smoke.
Hiroyuki Kikuchi, her husband and father of the children, escaped the flames and was taken to Alfred Hospital in a serious condition where he remains under police guard.
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Kaoru Okano lost her life alongside her three young daughters (pictured) in a horrific house fire in Melbourne’s east in the early hours of Sunday morning
Hiroyuki Kikuchi remains in hospital with serious burns after attempting to save his family from the fire
Mr Kikuchi’s memory of events will be crucial to investigators trying to piece together what started the blaze, but police say it is unlikely he will be capable of being interviewed until later this week.
As arson squad detectives work to solve the mystery, witnesses have described the tragic scene as the house buckled from the heat and clouds of smoke billowed into the air.
Neighbour Hanish Poonia said the panicked father was black with soot as he attempted to douse the flames and did not tell bystanders his children were still in the home.
‘He was in a panic and was trying to control the fire and because he was in a panic he was not able to communicate with us,’ he told the Herald Sun on Monday.
‘After the (fire) services got here, he started shouting “my kids, my kids, they are upstairs”.
‘If he had told us before, I think we would have gone in and tried to do something but it was too late,’ he said.
The development comes after neighbours told Daily Mail Australia Ms Okano had allegedly separated from Mr Kikuchi, 50, just weeks earlier and he had had been notably absent from the property for the past few weeks.
The young family had no chance of escaping the inferno (pictured, the rear of their home)
Kaoru Okano (pictured with one of her daughters) had tried to take cover from the blaze in the home’s en suite bathroom as the property became engulfed in smoke
Neighbours told Daily Mail Australia her husband, Hiroyuki Kikuchi, (pictured) was black with soot as he attempted to douse the flames
It is not suggested that Mr Kikuchi was in any way involved in starting the house fire.
Police investigators are treating the blaze as suspicious and the home remained cordoned off as detectives combed through the scene on Sunday.
Acting Deputy Commissioner Bob Hill told the publication flammable liquids found at the scene have been connected to Mr Kikuchi’s restaurant, Rolls Japanese Kitchen, in Balaclava in Melbourne’s inner-city.
Mr Hill said Mr Kikuchi would be questioned about that when medically cleared and at this stage it remained uncertain as to whether or not he would be able to shed light on what caused the blaze.
On Monday, friends and strangers alike attended the property to leave flowers and other tributes to the family.
Fire investigators returned to the home, checking licence plates in the car park underneath the rows of townhouses.
Neighbours have described seeing the family return home in the hours before the tragedy.
They had appeared happy, with the children enjoying ice-creams.
Alex Rodriquez said it appeared like any ordinary night in the neighbourhood until they woke to the sounds of screams and ‘banging’.
Strangers attended the home on Monday to lay flowers and other tributes
People continued to bring flowers throughout Monday
Hanish Poonia lived directly next door to the family. He saw their father covered in black soot as he attempted to help stop the blaze
Ms Okano regularly posted loving photos to Facebook of her children smiling and playing together
‘My brother told us to get out as quickly as possible,’ he said.
Mr Rodriquez said the tragedy had shocked residents across the adjoining townhouses.
‘The mother was beautiful. She was a wonderful, devoted, loving mother – the girls were beautiful and that’s what’s the saddest part about it.
‘I saw them every single day going to school, the mum taking them. They were beautiful.’
Neighbours have spoken of the chaotic moments that claimed the lives of the young family.
It took only minutes for the fire, which is believed to have started in the garage below the property, to turn into an inferno.
The garage was reportedly full of flammable materials such as oils, chemicals and rubbish.
Mr Rodriguez, whose partner is on crutches, said they had no time to render assistance.
‘We had to get out as quickly as possible and the fireys were all screaming at us to leave, so we had to just get out,’ he said.
Neighbours have described the family as ‘ordinary’, with no apparent signs of conflict within the home.
Neighbours have described seeing the family return home in the hours before the tragedy
Hiroyuki Kikuchi in happier times
Tributes have been left outside the home where the young family perished
Alex Rodriguez (right) and his partner were forced to flee their own home as the inferno took hold.
The mother’s body was found by emergency crews huddled together with those of her young girls
Police take a look at the boarded-up garage where the inferno is believed to have started
The house fire has also left another man in hospital with serious injuries (pictured, police at the scene on Saturday night)
‘We’ve just noticed that the father hasn’t been around the past few weeks. And he lived here,’ a neighbour said.
Ms Okano had regularly posted loving photos of her children on Facebook as they smiled and played together.
Her father, Yutaka Okano, who lives in Japan, expressed his heartbreak over the loss of his loved ones in a Facebook post this week.
‘January 10th will be remembered as a day that is too sad … too much to suffer,’ he wrote in a post translated into English.
Detective Senior Sergeant Neville Major said the bodies were found ‘huddled together’ in the bathroom.
‘There has been a very tragic incident here. There is a lot of damage in the garage area and the house has been engulfed in smoke,’ he said.
It took 35 firefighters several hours to bring the blaze under control, at which point they found the four bodies in the wreckage.
Authorities are working to determine the cause of the fire, but the arson squad has been drafted in to investigate.
The tragedy comes just a month after another fire, allegedly deliberately lit, claimed the lives of three Melburnians.
Abbey Forrest, 19, Inda Sohal, 28, and their baby daughter Ivy were all killed in the blaze at Point Cook in Melbourne’s south-west.
Jenny Hayes, 46, was arrested and charged with three counts of murder and arson causing death after allegedly starting the fire.
Anyone with further information on the Glen Waverley blaze is urged to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
Hiroyuki Kikuchi remains in hospital after the tragic fire
A view of the backyard of the home where four were killed
The backyard of the house where four perished in a tragic fire on Sunday
Gifts and tributes have been left outside the home of a tragic house fire
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