Firefighters said they have recovered two bodies in a Palolo home destroyed by fire this morning. A relative had earlier reported that an elderly man and woman were unaccounted for.

An official said a body was found in a back bedroom at 10:25 a.m. A second body was found in another area in the house at 10:40 a.m. The gender of each victim was not disclosed.

The fire broke out at about 6:24 a.m. at a home on La’i Road near the intersection with 10th Avenue, said Capt. Robert Main, a spokesman for the Honolulu Fire Department. Flames had engulfed the three-bedroom, wooden home when firefighters arrived. The fire was brought under control about a half-hour later.

A neighbor described the occupants of the home as a woman in her 90s and a man in his late 70s.

Firefighters shored up the foundation of the house, which is on a slope, with jacks because it had started to collapse.

Jean-Paul Chaine, who lives across the street from the home, said the flames spread quickly. He said he was making coffee when he smelled smoke and saw the fire. He ran downstairs and saw laundry hanging on a line outside of the burning home, but by the time he got to the street however, "I looked back up and the laundry was gone (burned.)"

Chaine said a Norfolk pine tree in the back of the house, "went up like a torch." He said the smoke was too thick for him to approach the house. Main said another unoccupied three-bedroom home on the property was also damaged. Both homes were built in the 1960s, Main said.

Police closed 10th Avenue between Palolo Avenue and La’i Road.

Thirty-eight firefighters from nine companies from Waikiki to McCully responded to the fire.

Smoke from the fire hung over much of Palolo Valley this morning.