A MUM has been left distraught after losing her treasured pets in a fire which ravaged her Charlton flat last week.

Sarah Gach’s ex-boyfriend had to leap out the window of her fourth-storey property in Gooding House, Valley Grove, when the blaze broke out in the early morning.

The impact as he hit the ground left him in hospital with several broken bones along with his burnt hands.

But for Ms Gach, most shocking was the loss of her two cats - Gus and Bella.

The pet shop worker said: “I feel so responsible, they were so innocent. There were claw marks on the windows where they tried to get out.

“Gus was everything to me. He was like one of my family. He made my day when I walked through the door.”

Along with the cats, she also lost a snake, a chameleon and a marine tank filled with fish which she had painstakingly set up in recent years.

She said: “I’ve lost all the fish, all my work - everything’s just gone in a minute.”

The mum, whose three-year-old daughter was staying with family at the time, had been at a friend’s house when the fire broke out.

Ms Gach went on: “It’s very hard. One minute I’m fine, the next minute I’m crying. Luckily I’ve got a lot of support around me.”

But she said that she could not face returning to the property, and was living with her mother temporarily.

The 26-year-old said: “Me and my daughter are homeless. I’m trying to sort out somewhere to live.

“I’ve got about three changes of clothes and my daughter can’t have any of her toys.”

Police from Plumstead CID are investigating the blaze, which broke out on February 15.

Watch manager Ray Barwell from East Greenwich fire station was at the scene.

He said: “This was a very serious incident and shows how important it is that people know how they’d get out of their home if there was a fire.”