A FIREFIGHTER is recovering after being taken to hospital with face and neck injuries sustained while battling a blaze at a house at Aylesford, near Maidstone.

The Larkfield-based fireman was scalded when a hot water tank leaked over him as he helped tackle the fire on the first floor of the house in Howick Close.

Fire crews said the owners of the house - a man and a woman - only escaped with their lives because they had installed a smoke alarm.

The blaze started in an airing cupboard at the terraced house, part of the Royal British Legion Village, just before 4.30am on Saturday. The couple were woken by the smoke alarm to find their first floor alight and rapidly filling up with smoke.

Sub officer Grant Brooker, of Larkfield Fire Station, said that although the injured firefighter was recovering at home he would still require further hospital treatment.