EMERGENCY crews could do nothing to save a woman who made a 999 call to a fire in her home, a Huddersfield inquest was told.
Rescuers found her slumped in an armchair at her Oakes home, still clutching her telephone.
The hearing was told Mrs Phyllis Allen, 78, suffered from asthma and severe emphysema and used both an inhaler and oxygen to ease her condition.
Just before her death on November 19 last year, she made a 999 call from her home. But fire crews and paramedics who arrived to find a chip pan fire in her kitchen were unable to save her.
Mrs Allen, a widow, lived alone at her one-bedroom home in Baker Street, Oakes.
The inquest was told any exertion would make her breathless. When on trips out she travelled in a wheelchair.
Her family made regular visits to check she was all right.
On the day she died, her granddaughter went to call and helped cook a meal, opening a kitchen window to disperse some smoke from a chip pan.
She checked the cooker as she left, thinking it was switched off.
However, firefighters later discovered a blaze in the kitchen.
The West Yorkshire coroner Roger Whittaker recorded a verdict of death by natural causes.
"She was not a well woman," said Mr Whittaker.
"Whether it was anxiety caused by some smoke in the house or fire or whatever, this is a natural cause of death."
