On the morning of 14 June 2017 at 00.54am, when Behailu Kebede made his 999 call from Flat 16 in Grenfell Tower, informing the fire brigade his fridge had burst into flames, unbeknown to the Fire Brigade the fire had burnt through a UPVC window frame and flames had begun to tear up the building fuelled by a devastating combination of flammable insulation and flammable cladding. Then
The stair lighting failed.
The smoke vents failed.
The fire doors failed.
The fire breaks between floors failed.
Badly fitting UPVC windows blazed and emitted deadly gases.
The insulation and cladding failed, due to their combustibility and to poorly fitted breaks and gaps which acted like a chimney.
The gas supply could not be turned off for 18 hours.
The ‘value engineered’ insulation (now banned) and cladding combination described as ‘solid petrol’ raged for hours.
The Council’s Tenant Management Organisation, had an emergency plan “but it was not activated and was in any case 15 years out of date”.
Council failed to make plans of the building available to the fire service earlier than 8:00am.
72 people died unnecessarily. Our hearts go out to all the families who have lost loved ones.
Into this nightmare, firefighters had to work to save lives with equipment inadequate for a combination of disastrous errors that should never have been allowed. They went in untrained for a disaster that should never have happened.
And here lies the problem with this back-to-front Inquiry.
Despite the preceding five years of appalling decision-making and dereliction of duty by those in power at the Tenants Management Organisation and authority, the fear the Inquiry would focus on the efforts of those sent to save lives into the hell created by others has come to be.
The Phase 1 report of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry is unfair, inequitable and seeks to blame the responders in place of those responsible.
The inquiry’s second phase will deal with events leading up to the fire.
Our thanks and gratitude go out to all those firemen who did their job to the best of their ability with the equipment they had, especially when “No building had ever behaved like that. No building ever should.”
Finally our hearts go out to all those who lost one of the 72.
