In early October of this year, a 20-year-old woman from Laulii braved a massive fire that destroyed their house on a Sunday morning to save her paralysed grandfather.

At a time when everyone runs out of burning buildings, she ran inside one.

Justine Faamasino is currently spending the festive season together with her grandfather after he was discharged from the hospital knowing no regrets after her successful rescue mission.

A fire broke out in the early hours of White Sunday and destroyed their house in Laulii while the old man and his granddaughters were sleeping.

The elderly man sustained major burns from the fire all over his body and was supervised at the main hospital in Motootua at the time.

Ms. Esera was the first to realise that there was a fire and helped her paralysed grandfather out of the window.

Recalling the fire incident, she said she called out to her father for help after she helped her grandfather out of the burning house and then went back inside to look for her sisters.

"The fire started from my grandfather's room and by the time I got there, his body was already out of the window while his legs were stuck inside the room so I went and helped him out before I called my father to come carry him away from the house," she told this newspaper.

"Then I went back inside to get my younger sisters who were sleeping in the room but when I got in the room they already jumped out through the window.

"It was the scariest thing I ever experienced but despite how shocked I was and scared, I jumped into that burning house to get my sisters and help my grandfather because I don't want any regrets later."

Meanwhile, her father, Moevai Asera said he is still trying to come to terms with the incident and how it would've turned out if it was to claim any of the lives of his daughters and his paralysed father.

"Up to this day I am still trying to process the incident because we've lost everything," he said. "And how painful it would be if it was to claim the lives of my daughters and my father who were sleeping in that house."

"We lost all our important documents, our property and especially our home for over 40 years but at least no one's life was taken from this unfortunate incident."

According to Mr. Asera, it was around 3am when he heard his eldest daughter calling for help. His wife and him were sleeping in their small shack at the back.

"I woke up to the house already on fire and not just one room or a small part of the house that was on fire but the whole house, there was nothing we could do about it," he explained.

"All I was worried about was my father and my daughters who were sleeping there so I just went and helped carry my father out and look for my daughters who were already outside of the house at the time."

Both the father and the daughter said it was a mosquito coil that was in the old man's room and they believe it is where the fire started from.

The family since the accident had moved to Luatuanuu with their other family to live there in the meantime while they rebuild.