Children killed in tower block fire

[limonchik]

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/8133871.stm

How awful - and a real worry for people who live in tower blocks. My sister was walking by earlier and could see people shouting for help from windows

BBC link

6 people have died including 3 children

Really tragic.

Terrible. one a three week old baby I believe.

It sounds horrendous, don't they have sprinkler systems in high rises? And with this weather it would have spread so quickly.

terrible news so sad for all the families affected.

How sad I have always though tower blocks are so dangerous for this kind of reason.

Oh I have just seen this on the news How horiffic it must have been for the residents. I know that what these kind of buildings replaced was a lot worse but they really are death traps, it's so sad I feel very priviliged to live in a nice, safe, terrace, no matter how small it is.

I'm angry This is the year 2009 for goodness sake! It might as well be 5000 BC. People have a basic right to safe housing, decent housing that allows space for family. At the very least. Why do we still have these monolithic, dinosaur housing blocks? At the moment unless you can afford to buy, getting a decent place (and by decent I mean safe with at least 2 bedrooms)is a lottery draw.
Consider some of the MPs who found it simply intolerable that their child/ren should have to share a room, or that they should have to travel long distances without a second home. Why do politicians insist that those less well off should live in conditions they themselves would find intolerable? They have managed to find the money for an entire Olympic villiage. So it's just that no one really cares until this sort of tragedy happens (doubtless some spokes person will say the building was previously thought to be safe/ good track record etc etc) It's very sad for the children and families

2kids I agree- what landllords, especially private ones can get away with is horrififc

this may also be a good time to remind people that they can get a free fire safety check that includes escape routes from their fire station, and to check thir smoke alarms also

totally agree.

I agree with you 2kids

Such a sad loss

It wasn't a privately owned block though - it was council housing.

TBH even if there are fire alarms and sprinkler systems etc in large blocks of flats that isn't enough, last year we lived in a brand new build block of flats, mentioned to the site office that the fire alarms in the communal stairwell were bleeping due to low backup batteries, they stopped, we assumed batteries had been changed, but when we went in to read the electricity meter were shocked to find they'd simply been switched off at the mains fuse especially awful since there had been an electrical fire in the building in one of the other flats (before we moved in) - we moved out before our tenancy even ended.

Basic housing should have basic fire escape provisions, especially if they are too high up to climb out of windows.

Just wondered what I can do to help from a distance?

That is so sad