Click here to see images

THESE are the first images of the devastation inside a fire ravaged towerblock flat where two Hampshire firefighters were killed tackling the blaze.

The true enormity of the fire, started by a curtain being left on top of a lamp, can be seen in a collection of images taken by police in the aftermath of the incident on the night of April 6, 2010.

Red Watch colleagues Alan Bannon and Jim Shears died after being overcome by a sudden surge in the temperature inside the split level flat on the ninth floor of Shirley Towers.

Their bodies were found in the doorways of the bedrooms on the upper level of flat 72. Both had become tangled in wires and cabling which had fallen from the ceiling compartments above them when the casing melted.

One of the striking images shows the lounge of what was then the home of Kirsty and Karl Hoffman and their young son, where the fire initially broke out.

An inquest into the two men's death has heard how the fire spread from the curtain, engulfing the couch and the lounge became logged with thick black smoke.

As the fire developed it took hold in the kitchen, on the same level, where it is believed the most intense temperatures were reached of up to 1000 degrees centigrade. In the picture you can see what remains of the cooker and some units which were deeply scorched.

Another image shows the stairway, where two red firefighting hoses had been laid, and the strings of fallen wiring similar to that which hampered the efforts of firemen inside the property that night.

Mr Bannon, 38, from Bitterne in Southampton and Mr Shears, 35, from Poole, had both ascended the stairways to the upper floor of the flat and had sought refuge in the bedrooms off the upper landing, from the surging heat.

Both men had to be rescued from the flat after losing contact with their colleagues over the radio system.

They were pulled out unconscious but despite desperate efforts to revive them, they died a short time later.

Proceeding.