A fireman removes what is left of the roof of the house.

An elderly man is homeless and suffering a shoulder injury after his three-room dwelling went up in flames on Friday morning. It was reported that about 9:30 a.m., residents of Monkey Lane in Lantop, St Thomas, saw fire coming from Charles Lindsay's board house.

A resident told our news team that they had originally thought the senior citizen was dead.

"Me did think him dead because he doesn't normally come out of the house during the day, him always wrap up in the bed sleeping. Is when we go roun' di side of the house, we saw him on the ground," the resident said.

A visibly traumatised Lindsay, 80, told our news team how he barely escaped death. "I was in mi bed lay down because I wasn't feeling well, then I felt a heat and when I look up I see fire coming from the roof, so all I could do was jump through the back door," he said, adding that he has no idea how the fire started.

Lindsay said he landed on his shoulder while attempting to escape the blaze, injuring it.

Residents said the elderly man and his grandson, who was not at home at the time, both lost everything in the blaze.

Firefighters from the Morant Bay Fire Station arrived at the scene shortly after, but were too late and so could be seen performing cooling-down activities.

The senior citizen's home was destroyed.

The Morant Bay police suspect the fire was due to a faulty illegal electrical connection.

A traumatised Charles Lindsay grips his shoulder after he injured it while escaping his fire-ravaged home. - Ian Allen photos