Fire officer relives fight to evacuate Grenfell

A fi re officer who battled to get Grenfell Tower evacuated has relived the harrowing moment he spoke to a trapped mot h e r whi l e h e r c h i l d r e n were dying.

Daniel Egan, a station manager in regulator y fire safety, arrived shortly before 2am on 14 June last year and co- ordinated 999 call information.

He realised “ver y early on” t h a t t h e i n f e r n o was o u t o f control and urged three senior fire officers to abandon the “stay put” advice given to occupants.

A full evacuation was eventually ordered at 2: 47am, almost two hours after the fire began.

Mr Egan told the inquiry into t he disaster t hat, as sunrise neared, a crew manager came over with a mobile phone.

On the end of the line was a mother who was in flat 113 or flat 133, the hearing at Holborn Bars was told, while her partner watched from the ground.

“All she said was...” Mr Egan s t a r t e d , b e f o r e p a u s i n g t o compose himself. “Sorry,” he continued. “S h e w a s s a y i n g s h e

j u s t wants to go, really, one of her children had already gone and the other one wasn’t moving and she had no reason to do any thing,” he said, his voice breaking.

The officer, who has 26 years’ service, also recalled a conversation with a man stuck on the tenth floor, who was a priority for rescue due to his proximity to the blaze.

H e s a i d : “T h e g u y wa s s o calm, he just believed we were going to get him out.”

On Tuesday, Mr Egan told the inquir y it was “obvious” that an evacuation was necessar y from the moment he arrived.

Asked yesterday by counsel t o t he i nquir y Ri c hard Millett QC at what stage he realised fire crews would not be a b l e t o ex t i n g u i s h t h e f i r e , Mr Egan said: “Ver y early on. There was so much fire that was going through into flats, just on my experience I know you weren’t going to get t he water to all of those floors, we just can’t physically do that.

“That’s where my opi ni on was, we needed to get the people out and once we get them out we could at least then try in a more strategic manner to try to extinguish the fire.”