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A family is without their home days before Christmas, after a fire tore through their Oak Bluff home.

Gerald Harris woke up just before 1 a.m. on Thursday to grab a snack, and noticed smoke coming up his hallway through his garage.

Gerald opened up a door near the fire to further investigate, but burned his hand in the process. A short time later the door blew off and threw him into the kitchen.

At that time, Gerald woke up the rest of his family and all eight of the people inside escaped the house with minor injuries.

But not everyone made it out of the house.

The Harris family say they escaped with the clothes on their backs. Global News

“Our pets didn’t make it out,” said Gerald’s wife Christina. “My mom has a registered service dog, we’re hoping she got out during the confusion but so far no one has been able to find her.”

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Linda Kruger is the owner of the service dog, a long haired-chihuahua named Ellie, that she hopes will be found safe.

“We didn’t have time to get anything, it was so fast.” Kruger said.

“She must be scared silly if she’s alive.”

A family cat did die in the fire.

The Harris family was renting the home and did not have tenant’s insurance, they said.

RCMP are investigating the cause of the fire, which appears to have started in the garage.

The family has set up a GoFundMe page, which you can find here.

The house and garage were completely engulfed in flames. Manitoba RCMP/Twitter