A pensioner accidentally caused a small blaze at her Rochester home after she failed to realise a makeshift fire-lighter left in a bin-bag was still alight.

Strood firefighters took more than an hour tackling flames inside the garden outbuilding at 11am on Tuesday.

The elderly woman, who has not been named, lit a piece of paper to light the fire at her home in Haig Avenue.

She then put the piece of paper in a rubbish bag and put the bag in the outbuilding.

Unfortunately the piece of paper was still smouldering and set alight the rubbish inside the bag.

Flames quickly spread inside the brick built building.

A spokesman said: “The fire was small but it had burnt the inside of the outhouse, but had not spread anywhere else.

“We were on the scene for about an hour.”