‘The fire is here and I’m dying’: Pleas from victims of the inferno
HUNDREDS STILL MISSING AFTER MASSIVE BLAZE IN LONDON
• A young artist posted a final message on Facebook: “Please pray for me and my mum” as the smoke engulfed their flat.
Khadija Saye and her mother, Mary Mendy, were among those feared to have died in the Grenfell Tower blaze in Kensington, west London. Police confirmed 12 people were dead but said that figure would rise significantly.
Hundreds of the roughly 500 residents in the block were unaccounted for Wednesday night. Some estimated that the death toll could rise above 100.
A total of 74 people were being treated in hospitals, with 20 of them in a critical condition after the fire, thought to have been sparked by a faulty refrigerator, started just after 1 a.m. Wednesday and quickly spread up the building.
Samira Lamrani said she saw a woman drop a baby from a window on the ninth or 10th floor to people on the sidewalk.
“People were starting to appear at the windows, frantically banging and screaming,” Lamrani told Britain’s Press Association news agency.
When the woman indicated she was going to drop the infant, “a gentleman ran forward and managed to grab the baby,” she added. Some residents knotted sheets together to make ropes in attempts to escape. Some tried to manufacture makeshift parachutes from garbage bags and bedding and leap out of windows.
Many of those that survived only did so by ignoring official advice to stay in their rooms and close their front doors until the fire was over.
More than 200 firefighters worked t hrough t he night and were still finding pockets of fire inside later in the day.
A huge plume of smoke wafted across the London skyline and left a burnedout hulk in the working class, multi- ethnic neighbourhood.
“In my 29 years of being a firefighter, I have never, ever seen anything of this scale,” Fire Commissioner Dany Cotton said.
The 24- storey tower was a “disaster waiting to happen” experts said. Fears were r ai s ed t hat green energy concerns were prioritized ahead of safety as it emerged that cladding used to make the building more sustainable could have accelerated the fire.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan said many questions must be answered about safety for the scores of other apartment blocks around the British capital.
The London Fire Brigade said it received t he first reports of the blaze at 12: 54 a. m. and the first fire engines arrived within six minutes.
Saye, the 24- year- old artist, was trapped in her 20th floor apartment with her mother.
David Lammy, a Labour MP, whose wife had mentored Saye, wrote on Twitter: “If you have any information about Khadija Saye please contact me.
“She is our dear friend, a beautiful soul and emerging artist.”
A 12- year- old girl was also missing. Jessica Ur- bano was last seen trying to escape from the 20th floor. Her family has checked all the hospitals but to no avail. Her sister Melanie said: “They don’t know anything. They don’t have lists.”
Her aunt Sandra Ruiz said: “Somebody gave her a phone and she rang her mum at 1:29 a.m. and at 1:39 a.m. She was with a group of people in the fire escape... That’s the last they’ve heard of her.”
Zainab Dean and her two- year- old son Jeremiah were in their flat on the 14th floor. Her brother Francis Dean said: “I told her to leave by the stairs but she said she had been told to stay inside her flat. I fear the worst.”
Hesham Reman, 57, had also been told to stay put in his 19 th- floor flat. His nephew Karim Musilly spoke to him by phone at 1:30 a.m.
“He had phoned the police who said stay in your flat and put a wet towel under the door,” said Musilly, “Then the phone went dead.”
Ali Yawar Jafari, 82, was with his wife and daughter in the elevator travelling down when, overcome by smoke, he decided to get out at the 10th floor.
His son, Hamid Ali Jafari, said he had not been seen since.
Saber Neda, 57, a fath- er- of- three, had not been seen since telling his wife Shakila, 45, and son, Farhad, 24, to flee the building while he stayed behind.
He was last heard from at 2:20 a.m. when he made a frantic call to say there was “no help” coming.
Nura Jamal and her two sons, aged six and 11, are still missing. Her daughter is understood to have been treated in hospital. Jamal called her friend at around 2 a.m. and said :“Forgive me, the fire is here, I’m dying.”
Another mother Ranya Ibrahim, 30, sent pleas for help from her Snapchat account at 3 a.m.
Her friend Maseen, who lives nearby, said :“My friend, Ranya Ibrahim, lives on the top floor with her two children who are just three and five years old.
“I received a Snapchat video from Ranya at 3 a.m. just after the fire started and I haven’t heard from her since.”
The Gr en fell Action Group has been warning about the risk of fire at the tower since 2013.
In a Nov. 20 blog, the group predicted that only “a catastrophic event” leading to “serious loss of life” would bring the outside scrutiny needed to make conditions safe f or residents.
“All our warnings fell on deaf ears and we predicted that a catastrophe like this was inevitable,” the group said after the fire broke out.
The Kensington a nd Chelsea Council said its immediate focus was helping victims and their families. It said the cause of the blaze would be “fully investigated.”
Built in the 1970s, the housing block was upgraded at a cost of US$ 12.8 million, with work finishing in May, 2016, according to the local council.
Rydon, the British company that did the refurbishing, said its work “met all required building control, fire regulation and health and safety standards.”
Britain’ s government ordered checks at tower blocks going through similar refurbishment amid concerns that the renovations that had been undertaken at the Grenfell Tower contributed to the spread of the blaze.
It was not immediately known if the building had a sprinkler system.
IN MY 29 YEARS OF BEING A FIREFIGHTER, I HAVE NEVER, EVER SEEN ANYTHING OF THIS SCALE.