House fire leaves 6 dead

There were no smoke detectors in the house, one fire official said.
CANTON (AP) -- An early morning fire engulfed a two-story house today, killing two adults and four children, authorities said.
A seventh person, a woman, was flown by helicopter to an Akron hospital in critical condition with burns, said Rick Walters, an investigator with the Stark County coroner's office.
A man who ran into the house to try to rescue a nephew and the others was among the six people who died, said the man's brother, James Knight. Donald Knight stopped to help when he saw the house burning as he was going to his home nearby in the blue-collar neighborhood of two-story homes.
"The whole house was engulfed. The whole house was nothing but red," James Knight said.
Tried to help
A man tried to use a garden house to douse flames, and another man who tied a bandanna around his face had to turn back on the front porch steps when he tried to go inside, neighbors said.
Two adults and a child pulled from the first floor died at the house, coroner's chief investigator Harry Campbell said. The three others found on the second floor were pronounced dead at hospitals.
Campbell said the children are believed to range in age from two months to 10 years. Authorities were trying to determine the victims' relationship.
Joyce Hodous, who lives three houses down the street, said she was awakened about 4 a.m. by the victims' yelling.
"There were children screaming to get out, 'Please, help me!,"' she said. Firefighters were already at the scene, she said.
Thought it was a cat
Shirley Young, who lives directly across the street, said she woke up when she heard a woman screaming for neighbors to call 911 from the home's porch.
"First it sounded like a cat, so we thought it was a cat yelling," she said. "We looked out the window and I saw the blazes coming out of the house."
Firefighters performed CPR on the front lawn on a young woman, Young said.
"The four children, they couldn't find them for a long time," Young said. "They found them and put two of them on one stretcher and took the four of them away."
City spokesman George Davis said firefighters could not get to the three people on the first floor until they knocked down flames.
Firefighters used ladders to get to the others in the top floor through the windows, Davis said.
The battalion captain told him the home had no smoke detectors, he said.