Fury as fire chief defends Grenfell ‘stay put’ advice
GRENFELL survivors reacted with fury last night after London’s chief fire officer said: ‘I wouldn’t change anything we did on the night.’
Commissioner Dany Cotton said she did not believe families trapped inside should have been told to get out earlier. They were instead told to ‘stay put’ in the tower and wait to be rescued.
There were gasps in the public inquiry into the tragedy as she said she would not have changed any aspect of her brigade’s response to the blaze that killed 72.
Survivors attacked her evidence as ‘heartbreaking and disrespectful’, and said they were disappointed the head of London Fire Brigade (LFB) had not accepted that mistakes had been made.
LFB has faced criticism that residents were told to stay put for almost two hours after the blaze began. Some of those who ignored the advice escaped safely. Asked if she now believed that the stay-put policy should have been abandoned earlier, Miss Cotton replied: ‘No, I don’t think so. The officers on the night acted with all the information they had in the best interests of the people at the time.’
She was then asked if there were any aspects of LFB’s response that she would change, responding: ‘I wouldn’t change anything we did on the night. I think without exception my firefighters performed in a fantastic way given the incredible circumstances they faced.’
Miss Cotton said the spread of the fire at Grenfell on June 14 last year was as unrealistic as ‘ a space shuttle landing at the Shard’, London’s tallest building.
Natasha Elcock, from campaign group Grenfell United, said the comparison was ‘flippant and disre- spectful’. She said: ‘ To hear Dany Cotton say she would not have done anything differently is heartbreaking and feels disrespectful to 72 people who lost their lives.’
She added: ‘Lives were saved by very brave individuals. However by equal measure, mistakes were made with tragic results. It’s disappointing and frustrating that the head of the fire service cannot accept those failings and learn from them.’
The inquiry has heard the fire spread through flammable cladding installed during a £9million council refurbishment, leaping 19 floors in only 12 minutes.
Miss Cotton, 49, said ‘significant building failures’ meant the fire had become ‘impossible’ to put out.
Earlier, she told how she tried to comfort firemen as they went inside the tower. She said firefighters were ‘terrified’ and she feared the tower would collapse on them like 9/11.
Miss Cotton also revealed she had undergone therapy for memory loss caused by post-traumatic shock.
She still has no memory of some events during the night, including narrowly avoiding being hit by a 6ft piece of burning debris.
The inquiry continues.
‘Heartbreaking and disrespectful’