Firefighters said James McPherson, 67, was pulled from his burning home at 737 Edgehill Road just before 8 a.m. He later died at a nearby hospital.
McPherson's brother told ABC11 he just happened to be driving by the house and saw smoke.
"I ran into the kitchen door and there was a lot of smoke in there. I tried to get down the hall, but I couldn't get down the hall. So I kept calling his name, calling and calling. And when I started coughing, I came back out through the carport and called 911," said Gregory McPherson.
Gregory said he had to watch helplessly as firefighters went in to find his brother.
"It was hard for me not to be able to get to him and then to see him come out in the condition he was in. That was tough," he said.
Firefighters said the cause of the fire appeared to be accidental.
"There's nothing suspicious. It all points to an electrical junction box under the floor," said Dennis Jones with the Fayetteville Fire Dept.
James McPherson lived in the home with his sister. She was not home when the fire broke out and she was not hurt.
Firefighters said there was not a smoke detector in the home and that might have alerted McPherson to the fire.
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