Evacuation at Seven sisters flats after blaze
AFIRE broke out after a mattress set alight inside a flat in one of the Seven Sisters tower blocks in Rochdale.
Fire crews were called to the blaze on College Bank Way at around 2.45am on Tuesday (October 27).
The fire involved a mattress in a ground floor flat, the fire service have confirmed.
The landlord, Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH), said the blaze was discovered by a ‘working watch’ monitoring the building.
Emergency services were then called to the scene.
Fire service crews from Rochdale and Heywood extinguished the blaze.
Two floors of the block - the floor the fire was on and the floor above it had to be evacuated.
No-one is believed to have been injured.
A spokesperson for the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service said: “At 2.46am on Tuesday, 27 October, firefighters were called to reports of a fire on College Bank Way, in Rochdale.
“Fire engines from Rochdale and Heywood stations quickly attended the scene. The fire involved a mattress in a ground floor flat. Crews used hose reels, breathing apparatus and a positive pressure ventilation fan to extinguish the fire.
“Firefighters were at the scene for around two hours and 15 minutes.”
A spokesperson from RBH told the Observer: “Our working watch that is in place within the block discovered the fire and called the fire service.
“We evacuated the floor that the fire was on and the floor above.
“The fire was on the ground floor and no-one was injured in the incident.”
Plans are in place to demolish four of the seven towers within the next six years.
In the meantime, new evacuation procedures have been implemented after surveyors uncovered problems with exterior panels fitted in the late 1990s.
They present a risk of fire spreading between flats on the same floor, an investigation found.
RBH has now recruited a company to monitor the buildings round-theclock in case of a fire.
A man, 58, died following a fire at a fifth-floor flat there in September last year.