Grenfell Tower fire in North Kensington - news and discussion

[hash tag]

Some of the people who were being interviewed during the night, including George Clark, were in tears and virtually speechless. It was horrible to hear those reports coming in. I liked to think that some of the reports were exagerated,
but seeing the pictures this morning, the scale of it is really starting to hit home.
It is difficult to imagine how the emergency services deal with a disaster on that scale and how the poor people survive.
Hoping for the best for all concerned.....

 

[stethoscope]

I remember when my mates flat was affected by fire originating in the flat below. Scary enough, but it seemed to follow the more common pattern of the immediate flats above/across from where it started. I can't imagine anything on such a scale to rip through like this.

Someone on Sky saying that it appears to have started on the fourth floor, but engulfed the whole block in about 15 minutes.

As far as I know, there's only one staircase in that block, so fear the worst. Poor people

Also incredibly calm and brave account from a resident on earlier - luckily they managed to evacuate from a lower floor.

 

[Sprocket.]

Truly awful incident. Poor people once again.

 

[crossthebreeze]

How the hell could it spread that quickly? And people saying no fire alarms. Just the stuff of nightmares, but real, and someone will be responsible for this. Those poor people

 

[moomoo]

Christ. This really is the stuff of nightmares. I've often looked at tower blocks and wondered what would happen in a fire.

 

[ElizabethofYork]

Christ. This really is the stuff of nightmares. I've often looked at tower blocks and wondered what would happen in a fire.

Yes. This really brings it home how vulnerable tower blocks are.

 

[Plumdaff]

No alarms? The poor people. Just horrendous.

 

[Geri]

My ex husband was rescued from a tower block fire in Birmingham when he lived there, the old lady in the flat above him didn't make it. I would never live in one by choice.

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

 

[Yossarian]

It's harrowing stuff, in one video children can be heard screaming for help. I don't know why the whole building went up in flames like that, there have been a few high-rise fires in Dubai in the last couple of years where the cladding on the outside caught fire and it looked horrifying, but the interiors weren't affected too badly.

 

[emanymton]

God this is horrendous

On the Radio this morning they did seem to talk to quite a few people who obviously made it out after the fire was well underway. Gives me some hope that the number of deaths might not be too high. Well it will be too high but you know what I mean.

 

[Sprocket.]

That was a very powerful interview on the BBC from s bloke that managed to get out with his partner and little girl.

They have just shown this again and credit to him in being able to give such a shocking eyewitness account and remain so calm. I would have been cursing like hell. It sounded truly horrifying.

 

[purenarcotic]

This is absolutely horrific, can't believe how quickly it went up, the account I watched said that they heard an alarm in the hallway but not in his flat and he didn't hear it until he was in the corridor. If he'd not heard neighbours screaming he'd have probably just gone back to bed. Frightening, absolutely frightening.

 

[planetgeli]

LBC just reported that the residents association of the building warned the landlords/owners of fire safety in a blog post.

KCTMO – Playing with fire! - Article referred to, not sure if I can post here so do remove if applicable.

Damning. Portentous. Ugh.

 

[omnipeta]

This is absolutely horrific, can't believe how quickly it went up, the account I watched said that they heard an alarm in the hallway but not in his flat and he didn't hear it until he was in the corridor. If he'd not heard neighbours screaming he'd have probably just gone back to bed. Frightening, absolutely frightening.

Very, very sad. :-(

 

[a_chap]

This photo would suggest the cladding caught fire very quickly

 

[Treacle Toes]

Good grief. This is beyond awful.

 

[1927]

Damning. Portentous. Ugh.

Another Fire Safety Scandal

This one is even more damning!

 

[Yossarian]

Glad to see the author of that Grenfell blog has survived, they have posted a roundup of all their warnings about poor fire safety standards.

GRENFELL TOWER FIRE

 

[Mation]

Can't get my head around how terrifying this must have been for those poor poor people

 

[MrSki]

I can't get my head round this. If there is a god he can fuck off.

 

[Mation]

Ian Bone has just said on Facebook that he used to live in this building.

 

[Who PhD]

I hope there are survivors, this is horrific

 

[ElizabethofYork]

Glad to see the author of that Grenfell blog has survived, they have posted a roundup of all their warnings about poor fire safety standards.

GRENFELL TOWER FIRE

Some fucking damning stuff there.

 

[albionism]

Saw an interview with a lad who escaped with his elderly aunt.
He said there was no integrated alarm system, just every flat
for itself .

 

[ruffneck23]

Its just fucking awful

 

[Cid]

This company seems to have been the subcontractor that provided the cladding system. And this would appear to be the specific product.

ACM is apparently aluminium composite material... Purely for reference purposes, making no judgment on whether the cladding was responsible, or could have been responsible.

 

[Cid]

And yeah, fucking terrible. Can't even begin to imagine.

 

[MrSki]

Ian Bone has just said on Facebook that he used to live in this building.

Lots of people used to live in this building. Lots of them are now homeless & lots of them are dead.

 

[Dogsauce]

Looking for strands of hope - the fact people were going around waking their neighbour's hopefully means most got out (despite the time of the event), that the fire appears to have gone up the exterior initially may mean that the interior wasn't immediately as bad as pictures look now (although smoke is usually biggest killer)

If it's anything like the block I'm in, finding out who is or isn't safe will be complicated by illegal sublets, air bnb etc.

Still really fucking grim and terrifying. Goes right through you just thinking about it. Thoughts with anyone caught up in it.