Seyyid Ahmed Nahi (33) and Ibrahim Souna (34) were among the first to spot the blaze, and quickly teamed up with a Polish man in an effort to gain entry to the house through the front door.<\/p>\n
They were met by intense heat and thick plumes of smoke but shouted inside, calling out to anybody who might be trapped by the blaze.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was a lot of smoke,\u201d recalled Ibrahim. \u201cWe shouted, asking if there was anybody in the house, and there was no response, no sign that there was somebody inside.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Ibrahim](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786354814_946_.jpeg\")
\n Ibrahim Souna Darragh McDonagh<\/p>\n
Darragh McDonagh\n<\/p>\n
Rather than leaving at that, however, they left the crowds that had gathered at the front of the building and went around the back, where they broke down the door and tried to get inside.<\/p>\n
This time, they could hear screaming and knew that there was somebody trapped upstairs.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen myself, the Polish guy, and Seyyid went around the back, we broke the door and got in. And that time, we heard people shouting, \u2018Help!\u2019 So, we took the action that we had to do,\u201d said Ibrahim.<\/p>\n
He initially tried to climb the drainpipe on the three-storey building in a desperate attempt to reach the two girls, but couldn\u2019t manage to get nearby.<\/p>\n
Instead, the three men began pushing a large trampoline towards the house from the back garden, struggling to move other items out of the way.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was not easy to move the trampoline there, so we tried our best to make it as close as possible to the wall,\u201d said the social care worker.<\/p>\n
The girls had gathered at a small window and were struggling to breathe with the fire expanding behind them.<\/p>\n
\u201cI tell this woman, you can jump first. First, just one. It was a big, big fire,\u201d said Seyyid.<\/p>\n
The 17-year-old jumped first, taking with her some sentimental items belonging to her baby brother, who had died tragically nearly five years ago.<\/p>\n
![\"Seyyid](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786354815_435_.jpeg\")
\n Seyyid Ahmed Nahi Darragh McDonagh<\/p>\n
Darragh McDonagh\n<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was screaming,\u201d recalled Ibrahim. \u201cShe hurt herself in the fall and was crying that she couldn\u2019t feel her legs. We tried to give her as much support as we could, assuring her that everything was going to be fine, not to think about anything \u2013 just to try and calm her down.\u201d<\/p>\n
The second girl\u2019s jump was more successful, though she also sustained injuries in the fall. The eldest had surgery at University Hospital Galway (UHG) on Friday, while the 14-year-old underwent an operation the following day.<\/p>\n
If there hadn\u2019t been a trampoline in the garden, it\u2019s unlikely that either of the girls would have made it out of the building alive, according to Ibrahim.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was very, very high, you see? There was no chance that somebody could have survived that fall without a trampoline.\u201d<\/p>\n
Once they were safely out of the house, the two teenagers were conscious but struggling to breathe due to smoke inhalation. Confusion ensued as one of them thought their younger siblings were still inside the burning building.<\/p>\n
This prompted the three men to try climbing upstairs again, but the other sister assured them that their brother and two sisters \u2013 aged between four and 15 \u2013 were already out of the building.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter that, we relaxed a little,\u201d said Ibrahim who, like Seyyid, is from Algeria and has lived and worked in Ireland since 2022.<\/p>\n
They had decided against moving the 17-year-old because they believed she had sustained a spinal injury. However, with the blaze threatening the area around the house, they had to evacuate her further away.<\/p>\n
When the emergency services arrived at the scene, Ibrahim and Seyyid directed cars to move from outside the property to make it easier for the fire service to access the site.<\/p>\n
Despite the two girls owing their lives to the actions of the three men, the two Algerians dismissed any talk of heroics or bravery.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just did our best. And fair play to the Polish guy and everybody else who was there,\u201d said Ibrahim.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you see people shouting and screaming in a fire, you can\u2019t just stand there and keep watching it. You try to do your best. Everyone tried to do their best that day, and thankfully the children survived.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TWO MEN WHO helped rescue a pair of teenage sisters from the third-floor of a burning building in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":629905,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,10228,1878,6,103046,266123,19,17,263835,11,12,15,16,5,266124,7,8],"class_list":["post-629904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-eire","tag-featured-news","tag-featurednews","tag-fire","tag-galway","tag-headlines","tag-house-fire","tag-ibrahim-souna","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-knocknacarra","tag-latest-news","tag-latestnews","tag-main-news","tag-mainnews","tag-news","tag-seyyid-ahmed-nahi","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117070557353344409","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=629904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/629905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=629904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=629904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=629904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}