A WOMAN delivering newspapers has been praised after raising the alarm which saved a life.

Lisbet Thiron-Thome was doing her evening round when she heard a smoke alarm going off in a house at Court Gardens, Witney.

After knocking on the front door of Paul Paintin's bungalow home she got no answer. She could hear the TV, so she lifted the letterbox to shout in.

"I got a face full of smoke and realised the place could be on fire and someone's life was at stake," said Ms Thiron-Thome, 41.

She alerted neighbours and the fire brigade.

Mr Paintin, who is unable to remember anything about the incident, received treatment for smoke inhalation.

Yesterday, he said a big thank you to Ms Thiron-Thome as she came to deliver his paper.

"I'd been out to have a few drinks on a day off and when I got back I put some toast on. I must have dozed off in the chair in front of the TV," he said.

"It was lucky she was coming, otherwise I don't like to think what would have happened. In a way, she rescued me."

Mr Paintin, 53, is a night-shift worker at Witney's Sainsbury's supermarket.

His rescuer lives at Pensclose, Witney, and has been delivering papers for several years.

She said: "I didn't have my mobile phone with me, so I went immediately knocking on neighbours' doors to get help and get a phone.

"The fire crews were then pretty quick, within minutes. You could tell the cooker had been smouldering away. It was noxious stuff, not just cooking fumes. When they got him out he was in a stupor, obviously affected by the fumes.

"I'm just glad I was there when someone really needed my help."

Chris Wilson, Witney fire station manager and community fire safety officer, said: "She did the right thing. If you hear a detector going off, call us straight away. The important thing is that this house had a smoke detector fitted and it saved a life."