Inquest Opens into Mother and Children's Fire Deaths

A Gloucestershire inquest opened Monday into the deaths of a mother and her two young children killed in a house fire on Boxing Day, revealing how the blaze rapidly engulfed their home as the family slept.

Fionnghuala Shearman, 38, known as Nu, her seven-year-old daughter Eve, and four-year-old son Ohner died from exposure to the combustion products of fire, according to provisional findings from a forensic pathologist. The incident occurred in the early hours of December 26, 2025, at the family's mid-terrace Cotswold stone cottage on Brimscombe Hill in Brimscombe, near Stroud. A neighbor reported the fire to emergency services at 3:12 a.m., and responders arrived to find the property well ablaze. It took firefighters some time to contain the flames, which destroyed the roof, ceilings, and stairs while causing extensive internal damage.

Tom Shearman, a police officer and the father, was the only occupant to escape alive. He told investigators that he and his wife awoke to smoke in the night and tried to reach the children's bedroom at the rear of the house. Overcome by heat and smoke, he smashed a bathroom window to exit and then attempted to reenter through it and force open...