Dozens feared dead in deathtrap tower
●Scottish councils order urgent review of tower block fire safety ●Residents say concerns were repeatedly ignored ●12 confirmed dead with scores of families still missing
A major investigation will take place into a devastating blaze in a tower block that housed hundreds of people after it emerged residents had raised safety fears over the building last year.
At least 12 people were killed and, with scores in hospital and an unknown number missing, the death toll is expected to rise following the inferno at the 24-storey Grenfell Tower in West London, which was believed to have housed up to 600 residents.
Prime Minister Theresa May vowed last night there will be a “proper investigation”, adding: “If there are any lessons to be learned they will be, and action will be taken.”
The disaster has prompted some Scottish councils including Edinburgh and Aberdeen to review their fire safety procedures for residents living in tower blocks. The Grenfell
Action Group residents’ association warned in blog posts late last year that it believed the building, which underwent a £8.5 million refurbishment in 2015-16, was dangerous.
The group said residents believed it would take a “catastrophic event” and “serious loss of life” for action to be taken to improve the building’s safety. Questions have also been raised over the external cladding that was put on the building to modernise its appearance during the refurbishment.
Firefighters worked around the clock yesterday to rescue 65 people from the burning building, with a total of 78 people – 18 of them critical – being treated in hospital as a result of their injuries.
Friends and relatives took to social media in a bid to find loved ones they believe could have been trapped inside. Unconfirmed reports claimed the blaze, which took hold shortly before 1am yesterday, started in a faulty fridge.
Eyewitnesses described children being thrown from windows and recounted harrowing stories of residents banging on their windows and screaming for help as the blaze spread around the building.
Samira Lamrani said she saw a woman try to save a baby by dropping it from a window “on the ninth or tenth floor” to waiting members of the public below.
Tiago Etienne, 17, heard people pleading for help as the building was engulfed in flames.
She said: “I saw children being thrown out of the building from as high as about the 15th floor. They were young aged probably between four and eight. I saw three thrown out. I think they were being thrown out for the firefighters or police to catch, but I couldn’t see from where I was who was at the bottom and what they were catching them in.”
Samia Badani, 41, was in a flat overlooking the fire and described hellish scenes unfolding behind windows.
“There was a woman who was banging on her window screaming and I saw her just get totally engulfed in flames,” she said.
Residents claimed that a fire alarm did not go off, while people claimed the cladding wrapped around the building had made the fire spread faster.
Muslim residents who were observing Ramadan and were awake when the fire began have been praised for their actions after raising the alarm with neighbours.
Local councillor Judith Blakeman, who lives opposite the tower, which contained 120 flats thought to be home to between 400 and 600 people, rushed outside when she heard about the blaze at 5am.
She said: “Neighbours had been watching it all night, they said the cladding went up like a nightdress by a fire – it just went whoosh.”
Firefighters described the scene as “like a war zone”.
One, named Terry, who spent eight hours working at the scene in North Kensington, said: “We had to literally run under police riot shields because of the amount of flaming debris, just to get into the building. There was one small staircase that everyone was going up. It was just like the images of 9/11.
“We were going up the staircase and people were coming down in smoke. I don’t know how they were breathing.”
He added: “To see a whole 24-storey building go up in flames – how does that happen? How does that happen in a first world country? How it happens in London in 2017 is anyone’s guess.”
London Fire Commissioner Dany Cotton said: “This is an unprecedented incident. In my 29 years of being a firefighter, I have never ever seen anything of this scale.”
Residents said that just last weekend, they had been given instructions by the fire brigade on how to respond in a fire.
They said they were told to close their doors and wait to be rescued as the fire doors would protect them for long enough for help to arrive.
One survivor said: “I think what has happened is that they’re not understanding that this fire has spread all around the building, so that is the wrong information for that building and the material in that building.”
She added: “If I had listened to the advice given to me by the fire brigade and also by the TMO [Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation] management team, we could be dead.”
Commander Stuart Cundy of the Metropolitan Police said: “Sadly I can confirm that there are now 12 people that have died that we know of.
“This is going to be a long and complex recovery operation and I do anticipate that the number of fatalities will sadly increase beyond those 12.”
Mr Cundy said that while every floor had been accessed, the whole building had not been searched, adding: “I don’t anticipate that there will be further survivors.”
COMMENT “Neighbours had been watching it all night, they said the cladding went up like a nightdress by a fire – it just went whoosh”
JUDITH BLAKEMAN