Firefighter: Warehouse missing from fire-inspection records

The illegally occupied Oakland warehouse where dozens of partygoers perished in a blaze does not appear in a database fire inspectors use to schedule inspections and may never have been checked for fire hazards, a firefighter with knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press.

Oakland fire officials are supposed to annually inspect commercial buildings for fire safety, with only single-family homes and duplexes exempted, according to a city website. Officials typically pull addresses from a database to request the yearly checks, said the firefighter Thursday, who feared retribution for disclosing the information and spoke only on condition of anonymity.

“Commercial inspections are conducted as time permits during a fire station’s 24-hour shift and are not routinely scheduled on an appointment basis,” the city’s website explains.

There’s a fire station right around the corner from the warehouse, which Derick Ion Almena, a sometimes-photographer who rented the building and sub-leased living space to artists, had dubbed the Ghost Ship.

The victims, ranging in age from 17 to 61, died while attending a $10-a-head dance party at the warehouse. On the campus of the University of California at Berkeley on Thursday, family members and friends hugged one another and wept as they spoke of two students, two recent graduates and a campus volunteer who died in the blaze. On Friday, all the names of the victims were released.

“There’s a part of our heart that’s missing today,” Michael Morris, father of 21-year-old victim Jennifer Morris, a musician and media studies major who died along with her roommate, Vanessa Plotkin, 21. Surrounded by the girl’s mother, older brother and cousin, Morris fought back tears. “She was so precious to us.”