Speculation mounts on cause of fatal fire

GARDAÍ will this morning begin a fifth day of forensic examination of the farmhouse where a fire claimed the lives of a young mother and her two children on Christmas morning.

The bodies of Sharon Whelan, 30, and her two daughters Zsara, 7, and Nadia, 2, were discovered shortly after 8.30am after neighbours saw smoke billowing from the remote farmhouse at Roscon, Co Kilkenny. Their bodies were rescued from the blazing rented house by a group of local men.

The access roads to the farmhouse remained cordoned off by gardaí last night as they continued their forensic examinations of the scene.