The owners of a dog who alerted them to a fire where eight people had to be rescued have told of the dramatic moment she saved their lives.

Miss Jones, nicknamed Moo, started barking incessantly just before 4am on Monday (November 17), waking up her owner Rob Jameson, 40, his girlfriend Anastazja Duda and his flatmate Tim Hughes, 42, at their flat in Stanlake Road, Shepherd’s Bush .

They opened their bedroom doors to be met with a wall of smoke and flames coming from the living room so Mr Jameson, the manager of popular Notting Hill pub, Portobello Gold, sprinted to the two upstairs flats to bang on the doors to wake up the five other people in two flats. Mr Hughes rang the fire brigade as he was barricaded into his room by the smoke.

A 999 call handler stayed on the phone with him until firefighters arrived to ensure they knew the layout of the flat.

Mr Hughes, a freelance producer, said: “I woke up to Moo barking like crazy so opened the door and was hit with a wall of smoke. She was sleeping in Rob’s room so he’d woken up about 30 seconds before and thought he could put the fire out by himself but quickly realised he couldn’t because the flames were getting pretty big so ran upstairs to let the other people know.

“She normally sleeps in the living room so she probably would have woken us up earlier but who knows if we would have got out in time.

“The 999 call handler told me to stay in my room because I couldn’t get out and when the firefighters came they checked I was ok, put the flames out then came to get me.

“Moo is such a great dog anyway but she’s been getting lots of treats since the fire. It was raining and cold when we were standing outside the flat after being rescued so we put a cardigan on her and she managed to find some cake in a hedge so she was alright. We’re very grateful to Moo.

“We didn’t have batteries in our smoke alarm because it had been beeping and it was on my list of things to do so if anybody can learn a lesson from this, it’s replace your batteries straight away.”

The living room was severely damaged by the fire. Pic: London Fire

Firefighters rescued four women from the first floor flat window and another woman from the roof of the second floor flat.

Mr Hughes said the fire was caused by an electrical fault but everything is melted so it is difficult to establish where it started.

Firefighters have nicknamed the intelligent mongrel Smokey.