A woman has been left with just the clothes on her back after all her belongings were torched in a blaze which destroyed her caravan and part of her home. Moya Nicolaysen, from Talgarreg in Ceredigion, was out shopping with her daughters on Saturday, March 11, when she received a phone call to say that her static caravan and container containing all her possessions were on fire.
Ms Nicolaysen was in the process of building a house in the area and was storing all of her belongings in the caravan and container until the property was livable. As well as staying with her children and friends she also stayed some nights in the caravan with her two dogs and three cats - all of whom were miraculously fine after the fire.
The mum-of-three said that seven fire engines battled the fire which completely flattened the caravan and container and damaged part of the home build. Her daughter has set up a fundraising page to try and help finance getting back some of her possessions but Ms Nicolaysen says her biggest priority is thanking those who helped salvage part of her property.
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She said: "It is devastating. My main thing is to try and say thank you to the neighbour across the road because he and his teenage son, Alwyn and Ifan, if they hadn't gone over there and moved the gas bottles out of the way and got up on the scaffolding to tip water on the fire even while the house was on fire it might have been worse. He just thought I was going to lose the whole lot.
"It's just the people that turned up to help. One of my builders turned up even though it was on a Saturday and he was up on the scaffolding. The big digger driver Rhydian turned up, these people are amazing."
Ms Nicolaysen says she still has no answers as to what started the fire and nothing appeared wrong before she went to work that morning. "I went off to work as I normally do and then went from work as I was going shopping with my daughters to Park Trostre and literally we had only been there around an hour and I got a call from my neighbour to say the caravan was on fire," she said.
The caravan and container were in the garden of the property-to-be and the flames caught on the side of the development damaging it. "The corner of the house, part of the roof, three of the windows were damaged, it all would have gone if he [her neighbour, Alwyn] hadn't been keeping it wet."
The caravan and container had been used to store all of Ms Nicolaysen's furniture and possessions until her home was ready. These have all been completely destroyed in the blaze as well as items from her mother who died in 2020 and heirlooms from older generations.
"Nothing in the caravan exists any more. I had a lot of the new stuff that was supposed to be going into the house being stored in the caravan," she said.
"The container was all my furniture, when I moved out of my other house I moved all the furniture into the container. On Saturday night I had literally the clothes I was standing in and my toothbrush for living. Obviously I have still got the house but trying to work it back now is hard.
"I don't think I thought it was going to be as bad as it was. My mum only died through covid so I had a lot of my mum's stuff in there too as she used to collect antiques and a lot of that was in there. And a painting I had saved up for months, that's gone. It's just things you can't replace. clothes etc you can replace isn't it?"
Ms Nicolaysen said that when she arrived the scene was "well alight" and that both the caravan and container had been completely demolished. She is now undergoing the process of clearing the site and says they have already filled one skip with debris. "I'll never be able to probably replace everything obviously because some things are one off but just try and replace the new stuff."
She is now hoping to find a way to thank all of her neighbours who helped to try and retrieve some of her belongings and protect her property. "Everybody's been so lovely," she said. "How can you thank someone who risked his own life? Someone who doesn't even really know me that well. They've just been so lovely. How do you say thank you for something like this?"
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