A HINDLEY mother was pulled unconscious from her blazing house after a 999 operator traced an emergency call to her mobile phone.

Deborah Smith, 26, of Lincoln Road, who is in intensive care at Wigan Infirmary, had phoned the emergency services when a blaze started in her living room on Thursday morning.

But during the call she was overcome by fumes and unable to tell the operator her address. The operator contacted the mobile phone company and discovered her address, then three fire engines from Hindley and Atherton were sent.

Firefighters gave mum of two Deborah oxygen at the scene and managed to bring her around.

Her children were not in the house at the time of the fire as they were spending the night at their grandparents' house. Station Commander at Hindley Fire Station Robert Coote said: "As the call was made on a mobile phone they were not sure whether the call had been made at the owner's address." Initially, it was feared her young children were also in the house and six firefighters wearing breathing apparatus searched the premises.

Mr Coote said: "The officers found the lady in an upstairs bedroom underneath the window. She was unconscious and not breathing."

He added that it was believed the fire had started in an armchair in the downstairs living room. Mr Coote said: "The fire was contained in the living room." Neighbour Glenys Rimmer said she saw smoke pouring out of a house window at about 3am in the morning. "The dog woke us up with his barking. We went outside and saw smoke gushing out of the window."

Station Commander Coote said there were important fire safety lessons which can be learnt from the fire: "I am not attaching any blame to anyone but there were two smoke alarms in the house which did not have any batteries in them."

A number of crank 999 calls have been made on mobile phones because people do not know their calls can be traced. A fire spokesman said: "People who have made a hoax call on their mobile have been quite surprised when we turned up at their house."