The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Vigil held for victims four weeks after tragic blaze
Dead remembered by a community in mourning
Four weeks after flames devoured Grenfell Tower, a grieving community stood quietly in its shadow to remember the dead.
Hundreds of mourners, many in tears, slowly filed down a wall plastered in tributes in the west London neighbourhood as dusk fell.
Pictures, flowers and handwritten messages are wrapped around swathes of the area, illuminated by candles brought out for the occasion.
The evening vigil was a moment of solemnity which has rounded off weeks in which those affected have lurched from rage to despair.
At least 80 people died in the inferno on June 14 while hundreds who called the block home were forced into emergency accommodation.
Among those at the vigil was Emma Dent Coad, the newly-elected MP for the area.
She took the Kensington seat a matter of days before the fire and said she knew people who died in the tower.
She told the Press Association: “I know a lot of people – I know people who have been lost, I know people who have lost people, I know people who are besides themselves with grief. It is really, really difficult.”
Last night it was also revealed that fire service advice to “stay put” inside Grenfell Tower during the fire lasted nearly two hours.
A change in policy recommending residents try to leave was made at 02:47 BST, one hour and 53 minutes after the first emergency call. London Fire Brigade said: “The advice our control officers give can change as the fire changes.”
When the fire was first reported at 00:54 BST, residents were initially given advice to “stay put” inside the building.
This is based on the assumption that fire can be contained, but the policy has come under scrutiny after many of the tower’s residents became trapped.
Paul Embery of the Fire Brigades Union said the stay put advice is “broadly sound”.
“At some point it was obvious that the advice needed to change. Whether it should have been changed earlier I wouldn’t want to speculate on that, but the inquiry clearly needs to look at it.”
London Fire Brigade said it cannot comment on its response to the fire due to the ongoing police investigation and public inquiry, but said “the advice our control officers give can change as the fire changes”.