CHADBOURN, N.C. (WNCN) — Crews were still at the scene Saturday afternoon after a house fire left four children dead in Columbus County overnight, officials said.

The fire was reported just after 2:30 a.m. Saturday at a home along North Colony Road, about a mile northeast of Chadbourn, Columbus County Fire Marshal Shannon Blackman told CBS 17.

The first emergency workers to respond were a deputy with the Columbus County Sheriff’s Office and a Chadbourn Rescue team that was returning from Columbus Regional Hospital in Whiteville, Blackman said.

The group arrived about seven minutes after the initial report and saw that the home was engulfed in flames, Blackman said.

In an update Monday from the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigations, who are now leading the charge on this fatal f

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