A 95-year-old woman was last night in a serious condition in hospital after she was rescued from a fire in her home today.

The elderly woman was found in the living room of her bungalow in Bradford Tradesmen’s Homes, in Lilycroft, Manningham, by firefighters wearing breathing apparatus.

Crews from Fairweather Green and Bradford were called to the scene at 1.21pm this afternoon.

Ian Gobbi, crew manager at Fairweather Green, said the fire had been caused by a discarded cigarette in the kitchen.

He said the fire had not spread to the living room, but the flames had been so intense the windows smashed and a door separating the two rooms had been destroyed. The woman was treated for inhailing smoke.

He said: “When we turned up the people stood outside couldn’t confirm whether there was anybody inside the bungalow or not.

“So we committed, initially, two breathing apparatus wearers who immediately located the elderly female occupier.”

The firefighters brought the woman out of the bungalow and handed her to paramedics, who took her to Bradford Royal Infirmary where she was last night described as being in a serious condition. Crew manager Gobbi said: “The smoke damage was considerable to the whole house.

“The fire was so intense that it burnt the door from the kitchen to the living area completely – there was nothing left of it.

“The fire broke through the kitchen windows which stopped a lot of the heat from actually going into the house, so the heat came out.

“But once the windows had gone it was a fire getting all the oxygen it needed.

“There was very little fire damage in the living room, but a lot of smoke damage.”

Crew manager Gobbi said all of the homes in the housing complex were fitted with battery-powered smoke alarms, but it was not known whether the woman’s alarm had worked as it had melted and fallen off the ceiling.

A West Yorkshire Police spokesman said the cause of the fire was under investigation.