A dad says he watched his skin slowly “melt away” while screaming for help as his whole body was engulfed in flames during a freak fire as his flat.
Stuart Cooper has been left with 66% of his body covered in burns after waking in the middle of the night to the inferno.
The 47-year-old, who was asleep at the time of the incident, recalls waking up to his melted mattress seeping into his skin.
Knowing his life was in danger, Stuart did everything he could to get help, trying to “wipe” the fire off his skin.
Stuart from Penzance said: "As I got out of my bedroom, still very much on fire, I had one quick, fleeting thought of: ‘f**k, I'm going to die in a fire.
"I just remember being in bed, then being engulfed in what can only be described as an inferno. I was walking around my flat trying to wipe flames off my body but was just spreading the fire.
"Finally, I made my way to the front door but it was locked. So, I then had to go back up into the fire, find my keys and then get back to the front door.
“Weirdly and amazingly, I never felt any pain whatsoever, which was probably down to all of my nerve endings and pain receptors being destroyed by the fire.
"However, when it came to attempting to unlock that front door, my skin was literally melting and sliding off the handle, the key and the fiddly little knob.
"My skin was like melted cheese. I somehow managed to get out, made my way to my neighbour and spent the best part of 15 minutes banging their door with my elbow as I had no skin on my hands."
Thanks to his own quick thinking and neighbour’s assistance, Stuart was rushed to Morriston Hospital in Swansea and was placed in a coma for six weeks for his body to recover.
Meanwhile, doctors told his four children to prepare for the worst.
Stuart doesn't know what caused his body to go up in flames that night, however, he thinks it may have been due to a gas hob being left on.
He said: "I had a portable gas stove that I used to make sandwiches for work and I can only assume I didn't turn off the gas properly before going to work.
"I was a smoker, and don't know if I went to have a cigarette, but was half asleep."
After coming out of the coma, the dad stayed in hospital for nine months and underwent more than 40 procedures to treat his burns.
Due to the damage to his nerves, he also had to re-learn how to do things like eat and even walk.
Stuart said: "After waking from the coma I was told I weighed just under seven stone – I was 12 stone before the accident. All muscle, nerve endings and pain receptors were totally destroyed.
"I couldn't walk and a breathing apparatus did my breathing for me. When I finally got them to remove the tube, I discovered I couldn't talk.
"I could make whisper noises but communicated by having nurses holding a whiteboard with the alphabet on it."
The accident and recovery has also taken a very heavy toll emotionally and mentally, with Stuart left with suicidal thoughts which eventually lead him to try and take his own life.
Stuart said: "I felt, and still feel, helpless. I wasn't a confident person before my accident but I was turned from a broken man that's broken in every sense.
"I was destroyed from the inside, the outside, psychologically, emotionally, and physically destroyed, I am unrecognisable from the person I used to be."
After nearly a year of being treated for his burns, Stuart was finally discharged from hospital on September 2021 and moved into a new flat.
According to the dad, it took more than 45 minutes for the fire to be controlled and at least three fire crews were called to tackle the blaze.
He said: "The fire service were amazing. I remember one fireman, clearly the chief that never left my side, he could see I was slowly lapsing into hypothermia and was constantly on his radio trying to get the ambulance hurried up.
"I actually knew one fireman, I was at school with his big sister, and he was a couple of years below us.
"He was amazing. Apparently, all I kept asking for, was my work bag and the cash I had in my bedroom cabinet.
"This man disappeared and then reappeared about 10 minutes later with my bag and he'd saved the cash.
"Everything else was destroyed in the fire. The firemen got what I apparently kept asking for but nothing else was salvageable!
"I could hear everything exploding and I'm amazed they even managed to get the two things I asked for."
More than three years on, since the harrowing ordeal which happened in October 2019, Stuart says he is still receiving occupational therapy, physiotherapy and cognitive therapy.
Despite his day-to-day struggles as he continues to recover, Stuart is hoping that one day he will be able to help burn survivors with their struggles – which is why he is choosing to share his story.
He added: "My hope one day is to be strong enough to be able to stand in front of other burns survivors and try to convince them that there's hope.
"I also hope to drive up to Swansea and speak to the beautiful staff in Morriston Hospital, seeing as they saved my life!"
