Help my baby, cried a mother. Then she threw her child from 9th floor... into blanket below

TWO hideous sounds summed up the horror – the screams of children and the sickening thump as people leapt to their deaths.

In scenes akin to New York on 9/11, at least five desperate souls chose to jump from the towering inferno to try to avoid burning to death.

One mother dropped her baby from a ninth-floor window, which was miraculously caught by a man holding out a blanket below.

Others tied bed sheets together to try to form ropes while some attempted to make parachutes out of bin liners.

Residents had been advised to stay in their flats and await rescue. But for those who did, the ferocity of the blaze meant they almost certainly perished.

The stairwell – the only escape route – was engulfed in intense heat and black smoke.

As the flames drew nearer, families phoned their loved ones to say goodbye.

It is almost unbelievable that such a tragedy could unfold in a country with some of the strictest fire regulations in the world.

12:50AM AND FRIDGE EXPLODES IN FLAT 16

The fate of the 600 residents of Grenfell Tower was sealed shortly before 12.50am, when the fridge in Flat 16 on the fourth floor apparently exploded into flames.

Neighbour Maryam Adam, 41, who is pregnant, said: ‘ He [her neighbour] knocked on the door, and he said there was a fire in his flat. It was exactly 12.50am because I was sleeping and it woke me up.

‘When we got up, I saw outside his flat his luggage – there was a big bag with his clothes.

‘That means he took the stuff from his flat, and then he told the neighbours.

‘The fire was small in the kitchen. I could see it because the flat door was open. There was no alarm.’

At 12.54am, the fire brigade was called, and the first engines arrived within six minutes. But witnesses said that the speed at which the fire tore up the tower was incredible – like ‘a tissue being set alight’.

Samira Lamrani said: ‘The man whose flat it was came out and said it was his flat. He was a slim, tall, white British man.

‘He was pointing at the fire on a lower floor and said, “That’s my flat, that’s it”. He said it was his fridge that had exploded.

‘ He started filming it on his phone. He was upset but I don’t think he had a clue about the scale of what was happening.

‘After that the fire went up in minutes, it was so fast. The speed with which it took hold was terrifying. It was like a tissue being set alight. It just went whoosh, so quickly. I didn’t see him after that.’

CHAOS AND A CACOPHONY OF SCREAMING CHILDREN

Chaos and confusion swept through the tower block as its residents were woken up by sirens, screams and the smell of acrid smoke.

Mrs Lamrani said: ‘The sound of children begging for help as they were trapped in the upper floors is something I will never be able to forget.

‘It was a cacophony of anguished screams, horrendous to listen to. It was traumatising – their voices, their high pitched voices – I could hear them screaming for their lives.’

Within minutes, it became clear that the advice to residents to stay in their flats until help arrived was beginning to cost lives. Some had left their flats but been ordered back inside by emergency services, it was reported.

Witnesses watched helplessly as people trapped in smoke-filled flats took it in turns to suck breaths of air through windows designed to open only fractionally.

MOBILE PHONES USED AS TORCHES TO SIGNAL HELP

Trapped residents flashed torches, their mobile phones and even fairy lights from their windows in a desperate attempt to attract the attention of rescuers.

One witness said: ‘People were taking it in turns to get air from the window, and flashing their phones, and then the fire just took them. You could hear people yelling from the top, “Help, get my children out!” and you are just standing there, and watching people die, burning…’

MIRACLE OF THE BABY CAUGHT IN A BLANKET

Mrs Lamrani said: ‘A woman shouted down frantically for someone to help her baby. A man came with a blanket and waited down below. Amazingly he caught the baby, which looked OK. The child was about 11 months old.

‘But one middle-aged man came down from a long way up, and landed on the floor with an awful thump. I don’t think the paramedics could do anything for him, he came from so high.’

DESPERATE RESIDENTS JUMP TO THEIR DEATHS

It is believed the first five people to be confirmed dead were those who had jumped or fallen.

One resident wept as he described how people ‘just threw their kids out, screaming “save my children”.’ Another said his mother stepped over a dead body to escape the building.

One man claimed he saw a child who was on fire leap from the 22nd floor, adding: ‘He walked to the window, and he jumped.’

Another witness, Mahad Egal, said he saw children being thrown from the building, adding: ‘It was rapid, the fire was growing well out of control. There is only the stairs, which is smoke, it’s dark, it’s scary, it’s a trip hazard. There are elderly, there are children, there’s disabled people. People were jumping out of the place, there is a man who threw two of his children.’

Another resident, called Zara, said she saw a mother with a boy who looked about five at a fifth or sixth floor window. She told LBC: ‘She actually threw her son out of the window. I think he’s OK.’

DIY PARACHUTES AND BED SHEET ROPES

Others used makeshift parachutes from bin bags tied together to try to slow their descents. One resident fashioned a 30ft rope made from bed sheets tied together. Police pleaded with them not to

attempt sliding down it. The fate of the resident is not known.

Another person, who lived on the seventh floor, told Radio 5Live he only woke up at around 2am because he heard people screaming, ‘don’t jump’.

By now, the entire building was ablaze, and there was no way in or out. Brave firefighters were beaten back by the intense heat for several hours.

Another witness, Ubaidah Rachi, 15, said: ‘I saw a mother and father and their two children screaming and shouting for someone to rescue them. I could see the flames and smoke growing higher and higher below them. Eventually the flames reached them and swallowed the whole family. It was a terrible, terrible sight.’

POLICE STOP RELATIVES RUNNING INTO BLAZE

Police had to physically stop rela- tives running inside the blazing tower to rescue their loved ones.

Sarah Ali, 26, said: ‘ They had family and children inside. They rushed towards it. The police tried to stop them but couldn’t prevent them all.’

Another local said: ‘ There was one policeman near where I was. Everyone was asking him what to do and he was standing there looking as shocked and bewildered as the rest of us.

‘ People were screaming and running around, there was smoke everywhere, and they just didn’t know what to do.’

Jamie Martin climbed out through a window to escape the inferno. He told BBC Radio 4: ‘Bits of the building were falling off, I scalded my shin on a hot piece of metal. I was shouting “Get out, get out” to people as I saw them and they were shouting back, “We can’t, the corridors are full of smoke”.’ IT WAS LIKE 9/11 OR A HOLLYWOOD MOVIE Muna Ali, 45, said: ‘It just reminded me of 9/11.’ Resident Zara added: ‘It was like a scene from a Hollywood movie.

‘ There was another woman screaming “My baby, my baby, I need to get out, I need to save my baby”. We were just looking up. We couldn’t do anything. There was nothing we could do.’

Rescuers held riot shields over their heads as debris rained down, and several firefighters were injured.

A witness called Linda told LBC radio she watched huge chunks of polystyrene-type material falling from the building.

‘It was everywhere, it was like snow,’ she said. ‘There were larger sheets and small pieces. It was coming down everywhere.’

Local resident Tamara told BBC News: ‘ There were people just throwing their kids out, saying “Save my children”.

‘The fire crew, ambulance and police couldn’t do anything, they couldn’t get in.

‘They were just telling them to stay where they are, and “we’ll come and get you”.

‘But things quickly escalated beyond measure and they couldn’t go back in and get them.

‘Within another 15 minutes the whole thing was up in flames and there were still people at their windows shouting “Help me”. You could see the fire going into their houses and engulfing the last room that they were in.’

Actor and writer Tim Downie, who lives nearby, described it as ‘the most terrifying thing I’ve ever seen’, while neighbour Amanda Fernandez, 32, said it was ‘like Armageddon’.

Twelve hours after it had begun, fire crews were still battling to contain the flames. TEMPERS FLARE OVER THIS ‘MASS MURDER’ On the ground outside the tower, tempers were flaring too.

Edward Daffarn, a member of the Grenfell Action Group, turned on a police officer and a local councillor and claimed ‘mass murder’ had been committed.

Councillor Catherine Faulks said: ‘Please don’t try to make this political,’ to which Mr Daffarn replied: ‘How dare you talk like that! This is all about politics, cost- cutting by the council and lack of care for people in that building.

‘People have blood on their hands and will go to prison for what has happened here – it is a disgrace. People in the community deserve better but they have been sold out and now they have died.’