AN investigation is to be launched after two elderly women were pulled unconscious from their fume filled home.

Jean Cooper, 73, and Rhoda Bowyer, 70, would have died had their close friend Jenny Kiely not arrived with her husband Patrick and dragged them out into the fresh air.

Mr and Mrs Kiely, of High Street, Manton, rushed to the women's Pewsey home after receiving a mumbled phone call from Miss Bowyer as she was on the verge of collapse.

Deadly carbon monoxide fumes from a solid fuel stove in their High Street cottage are being blamed for last Wednesday's drama.

Now the women are calling for an investigation into why their chimney, which was swept two months ago by a sweep from near Salisbury, was blocked with soot when it was checked by Pewsey sweep David Worsdell on Thursday.

He removed a sack of soot from the flue which they are keeping pending an investigation, which they are to ask trading standards officers to carry out.

Mrs Kiely, who used to live next door to the women, said she got her husband to rush her to their home after receiving a phone call from Miss Bowyer, who she said sounded drunk. Miss Bowyer kept mumbling that she could not get Mrs Cooper to wake up and she could not get the fire to burn.

But Miss Bowyer, who is Mrs Cooper's live-in carer, cannot remember making the call and said she must have managed to dial the Kielys' number as an automatic action before passing out.

Mrs Cooper was unconscious and Miss Bowyer was lapsing in and out of consciousness when the Kielys arrived.

First they had to talk Miss Bowyer into unbolting the door. When Mr and Mrs Kiely pushed past the door they found Miss Bowyer slumped in the hall and Mrs Cooper unconscious in a neighbouring room. Their two dogs, Shannon and Becky, were also unconscious.

Mr and Mrs Kiely dialled 999 and within minutes Pewsey firefighters were on the scene. The crew gave the women oxygen until paramedics arrived and took them to the Princess Margaret Hospital in Swindon where they were detained for 24 hours for observation.

The two women and their dogs have made a full recovery.

Miss Bowyer said: "Jean had been sleeping a lot that evening but she had not been well and I put it down to that."

She said they had not smelled fumes from the stove in the sitting room, but the room had started to fill with smoke.

Miss Bowyer said: "I left the door open to try to clear it and that probably saved our lives. Jenny said I telephoned her but I can't remember doing it because the fumes had got to me as well."

Both women praised the Kielys, the fire crew and their neighbours for their help. Miss Bowyer said: "If help hadn't arrived I don't think there is any doubt that we would both have died."