| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Fluffy |
Posted - 02/21/2003 : 2:45:49 PM
This is something alot of us probably either take for granted or worse yet, don't even think about. When you are out enjoying a show, please take care to note the nearest fire exit and have an escape plan should something like this happen at a club near you.
Dozens Die in RI Night Club Fire
by Amy Forliti c.AssPress
WEST WARWICK, R.I. (Feb. 21) - A nightclub erupted in a raging fire during a pyrotechnics display at a rock concert, killing at least 85 people and injuring more than 160 others as frantic mobs rushed to escape. Club officials said Friday the special effects were used without permission.
The death toll rose as firefighters searched through the charred shell of the single-story wood building. Town Manager Wolfgang Bauer said the number of dead had reached 75 by midday Friday and ''I don't think we're done yet.''
''They are still pulling bodies out,'' Gov. Don Carcieri said after rushing back to the state from a Florida vacation. ''This building went up fast - nobody had a chance.''
It was the deadliest U.S. fire since nearly 80 people died in the 1993 inferno at the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas. It also came less than a week after 21 people were killed in a stampede at a Chicago nightspot.
The '80s hard rock band Great White had just started playing Thursday night when giant pyrotechnic sparklers on stage began shooting up and ignited the ceiling above them and soundproofing near the stage. Some in the crowd said they thought it was part of the act, but the fire quickly spread through the low-ceilinged building, filling it with thick, black smoke.
The entire club was engulfed in flames within three minutes, Fire Chief Charles Hall said. Capacity at The Station Concert Club was 300, but Hall said fewer people than that were inside the building.
Robin Petrarca, 44, was standing within a few feet of a door, but said she couldn't see the exit because of the billowing smoke. In the rush to escape, she fell and was trampled, but made it out.
''There was nothing they could do, it went up so fast,'' she said.
Hall said the club recently passed a fire inspection, but didn't have a city permit for pyrotechnics. The building, which is at least 60 years old, was not required to have a sprinkler system because of its small size.
The pyrotechnics were used without permission from the club, said Kathleen Hagerty, a lawyer representing club owners Michael and Jeffrey Derderian.
''No permission was ever requested by the band or its agents to use pyrotechnics at The Station, and no permission was ever given,'' she said.
The band's singer, Jack Russell, said the manager checked with the club before the show and the use of pyrotechnics was approved. And Paul Woolnough, president of Great White's management company, said tour manager Dan Biechele ''always checks'' with club officials before pyrotechnics are used.
''I'm not going to reply to those allegations, but I do know that the club would have been informed, as they always are,'' Woolnough said. Biechele could not immediately be located for comment.
The owner of a well-known New Jersey nightclub said Great White failed to tell him they were using pyrotechnics for a concert there a week ago.
''Our stage manager didn't even know it until it was done,'' said Domenic Santana, owner of the Stone Pony in Asbury Park. ''My sound man freaked out because of the heat and everything, and they jeopardized the health and the safety of our patrons.''
Most of the bodies were found near The Station's front exit, some of them burned and others dead from smoke inhalation. Hall also said some appeared to have been trampled in the rush to escape.
''They tried to go out the same way they came in. That was the problem,'' Hall said. ''They didn't use the other three fire exits.''
More than 160 people were taken to area hospitals, Bauer said. Many were taken to Rhode Island Hospital and 38 remained there Friday, 14 of them in critical condition with severe burns and suffering from smoke inhalation.
The ages of the victims ranged from the teens to the late 30s.
''As much as we can prepare for anything like this the stark reality is hard to imagine,'' said Dr. Joseph Amaral, a surgeon and the hospital's president. ''One of the most remarkable things for me is the degree of inhalation injuries that everyone sustained.''
The blaze broke out at about 11 p.m. during the first song at the concert in West Warwick, about 15 miles southwest of Providence.
''All of a sudden I felt a lot of heat,'' said Russell, the band's singer. ''I see the foam's on fire. ... The next thing you know the whole place is in flames.''
He said he started dousing the fire with a water bottle but couldn't put it out, then all the lights went out.
''I just couldn't believe how fast it went up,'' he said. Russell said one of his band members, guitarist Ty Longley, was among the missing.
Firefighters worked through the morning Friday to pull charred bodies from the building as onlookers watched, worried about missing friends.
''They were completely burned. They had pieces of flesh falling off them,'' said Michelle Craine, who was waiting to hear about a friend who was missing. ''It was the worst thing I've ever seen.''
Nearly 200 people gathered at a family center set up at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Warwick by the American Red Cross of Rhode Island. Grief counselors and clergy members were on hand.
Witnesses described seeing dozens of people dash toward for the door after the fire began, and some of those who escaped were later seen staggering into a triage center. Rescuers pulled badly injured victims from the fire as ladder trucks poured water over the flaming skeleton of the building.
''It was calm at first, everyone thought it was part of the act,'' said John DiMeo, who was sitting at the bar near the front door when the fire started. ''It happened so fast.''
Brian Butler was filming the concert for WPRI-TV and saw the flames spread across the ceiling and people rush for the doors.
''People were trying to help others and people were smashing out windows, and people were pulling on people and nobody cared how many cuts they got, nobody cared about the bruises or the burns,'' Butler said. ''They just wanted out of the building.''
The club had passed a fire code compliance inspection Dec. 31 to get its liquor license renewed, Hall said. He said sprinklers were not required because of the building's size, but a license would have been required for the pyrotechnic display.
Great White is a heavy metal band whose hits include ''Once Bitten, Twice Shy'' and ''Rock Me.'' The band emerged in the Los Angeles metal scene of the late 1980s, selling 6 million albums and earning a Grammy nomination in 1990.
They continued to tour and make albums in recent years, maintaining a strong allegiance of fans from their glory days of the 1980s.
It was the second tragedy at a U.S. club in four days. Early Monday, 21 people were killed and more than 50 were injured in the Chicago melee, which began after a security guard used pepper spray to break up a fight.
The worst nightclub fire in the United States was Nov. 28, 1942, when 491 people died at Boston's Cocoanut Grove nightclub.
AP-NY-02-21-03 1328EST
Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. |
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| tericee |
Posted - 02/24/2003 : 4:56:00 PM
Are they checking out the 9:30 Club too, Fluffy? Or all the DC clubs for that matter? |
| PJK |
Posted - 02/24/2003 : 07:19:26 AM
I wondered the same thing Teri. Maybe papers were destroyed in the fire. Doesn't really matter, it won't bring anyone back from the dead.
Actually when I was packed into the North Star bar in Philly to hear Tony Levin play the thought did cross my mind that if there was a fire, I'd be dead. No way I would have been able to get out. They have a huge rug in back of the stage as a back drop, if that went up who knows what would happen.
Mayor Street is supposedly checking all the Philly night clubs so this doesn't happen here.....yeah, right like I really trust him. |
| tericee |
Posted - 02/23/2003 : 10:49:27 PM
I can't believe there is an argument between the band and the venue about whether the pyrotechnics were approved or not. I thought there was always a contract; if fire were allowed wouldn't it be in there?
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| Evergreen |
Posted - 02/22/2003 : 08:18:33 AM
I saw the press conference with the fire chief yesterday. I have not seen or heard such disturbing information in awhile. Like the article above, he kept saying the WHOLE building was engulfed in flames in 3 MINUTES. He said if you weren't near and almost out a door in 30 seconds you really didn't have a chance. I had heard quick news reports earlier and thought there was confusion and panic and people just spent alot of time fighting each other for the doors(like in Chicago).
3 MINUTES!!! The reporters kept asking him such f*#%ing dumb questions like did the emergency lights come on and did security try to help anyone out of the building who was near the stage.
Filled with black smoke in 30 seconds and engulfed in 3 minutes!!!!! UUUMMMM, I don't think any of that mattered.
When I think about all the TIMes I have been in sold out clubs watching a band in a tightly packed mass of people up near the stage, I understand why they didn't have much of a chance to get near a door in that short a TIMe. It's so creepy and disturbing to think about it. Fluffy, I can't imagine how you must be feeling about it. Granted, to go up so quickly it would seem like the pyrotechnics and the materials of the building would have to be in the equation, but still. The Pod members met and discussed it and Tim won't be allowed to have fire and explosions on stage!!!!!!Ever!!!!! And Fluffy, you won't be allowed to work shows at the 9:30 club when bands have fire as part of their show unless your working at the door!
A few years ago I was at Great Woods in Mass. (now called the Tweeter center)watching Pornos for Pyros. Part of their stage and a dancer on stilts in a huge poofy dress caught on fire from the shows pyrotechnics. It all happened so fast. We initially thought it was part of the show until the whole stage went silent, Pandora the dancer fell to the floor, and people were scrambling and yelling trying to wrap her up to put out the burning dress. A very dazed Perry Farrell came on to say what happen a few minutes later. The fire wasn't too bad except for Pandora who got rushed off to the hospital(we found out at the Burlington show a few weeks later that she wasn't burned or hurt as someone in the audience had made a huge sign that said "How's Pandora" and Perry spoke about it). A few guitar cords burned up. They were fixed while Perry did a few acoustic songs then the whole band played for a little while longer(minus anymore pyrotechnics). The show was definitely cut short. I couldn't believe they actually played anymore with one of their people hurt and would have totally understood however bummed I would have been if they quit when it happened. Maybe they thought the crowd would riot like the one in Montreal when James from Metallica was burned back in 1992. Great Woods as you probably know is an outdoor pavillion type of building so no one watching the show was in any real danger. Escape would have been very easy, but how quickly it all happened was alarming. When Pornos played in an enclosed building in B'ton 2 wks later, they didn't have Pandora or any pyrotechnics.
Too bad that 80's big hair band didn't follow suit and all the appropriate parties didn't file for permits or that crappy building was even a club at all. Apparently, that band almost caught the last place they played on fire, according to the previous clubs manager. I guess the most alarming thing and the saddest thing is that it all could have been prevented in so many different ways. |
| Fluffy |
Posted - 02/22/2003 : 02:58:28 AM
Dozens Dead In Nightclub Fire
by Elizabeth Zuckerman c.AssPress
WEST WARWICK, R.I. (Feb. 21) - Great White was rocking through its first song, ''Desert Moon,'' and the fans were cheering as fireworks sprayed the stage with sparks. They kept cheering even as flames shot toward the ceiling. Within three minutes, many of them were dead.
At least 96 people died in The Station nightclub on Thursday night, burned or crushed in their frantic fight to escape the old wooden building. Nearly 200 more were injured, 35 critically.
Club officials said they had not given the band permission to use pyrotechnics, a claim echoed by at least three other venues where Great White played in the past month. The band disputed the accusations, and Rhode Island Attorney General Patrick Lynch said authorities were investigating.
Many concertgoers were caught off-guard as they slowly realized the fire wasn't part of the show. Many were badly burned and others were trampled in the rush to escape, in large part through a single door.
''I never knew a place could burn so fast,'' said Robin Petrarca, 44, who was roughed up in the scramble to escape. She said the smoke was so thick she couldn't see an exit just 5 feet away.
It was the deadliest U.S. nightclub fire since 165 people were killed at the Beverly Hills Supper Club in Southgate, Ky., in 1977. It also came less than a week after 21 people were killed in a stampede at a Chicago nightspot.
The capacity of The Station was 300, but the number of victims and survivors indicated more were inside. The death toll rose steadily Friday as firefighters picked through the smoking ruins of the single-story building.
''This building went up fast - nobody had a chance,'' said Gov. Don Carcieri, who rushed back to the state from a trip to Florida.
Under the glare of floodlights, a dozen firefighters and other law enforcement officials used rakes to sift through the rubble Friday night as they searched for evidence and belongings of the victims. A corner of the building was still standing, along with the marquee, still advertising Great White's appearance.
Late Friday, the governor said seven of the dead had been identified. No names were released. At hospitals around the region, anguished relatives pleaded for help in finding loved ones they feared were lost in the club.
Patricia Belanger stood trembling outside Rhode Island Hospital, clutching a photo of her daughter, Dina DeMaio, who was working at the club as a waitress to earn some extra money for herself and her 7-year-old son.
Belanger said she had not been able to find her daughter and was unable to tell her grandson about his mother's possible death.
''He knows his mother didn't come back,'' she said.
The fire was apparently touched off by pyrotechnics moments after the '80s hard-rock band kicked off its show. A TV cameraman doing a story on nightclub safety recorded the unfolding disaster, beginning with the fireworks, followed seconds later by bright orange flames climbing curtains and soundproofing behind the stage. In moments, the stage was enveloped in a bright yellow haze; among those missing late Friday was guitarist Ty Longley.
Lead singer Jack Russell said he started dousing the fire with a water bottle but couldn't put it out. Then all the lights went out.
''All of a sudden I felt a lot of heat,'' Russell said. ''I see the foam's on fire. ... The next thing you know the whole place is in flames.''
At least 25 bodies were found near the club's front exit. Fire Chief Charles Hall said some victims were trampled.
''They tried to go out the same way they came in. That was the problem,'' Hall said. ''They didn't use the other three fire exits.''
Fire officials said the club had passed a fire inspection Dec. 31, but didn't have a city permit for pyrotechnics. The building, which is at least 60 years old, was not required to have a sprinkler system because of its small size.
The pyrotechnics were used without permission, said Kathleen Hagerty, a lawyer representing club owners Michael and Jeffrey Derderian, who are brothers.
''No permission was ever requested by the band or its agents to use pyrotechnics at The Station, and no permission was ever given,'' she said.
Russell said the band's manager checked with the club before the show and that the use of pyrotechnics was approved. Paul Woolnough, president of Great White's management company, also said tour manager Dan Biechele ''always checks'' with club officials before pyrotechnics are used. Biechele could not be located for comment.
The owner of a well-known New Jersey nightclub said Great White failed to tell him they were using pyrotechnics for a Valentine's Day show.
''Our stage manager didn't even know it until it was done,'' said Domenic Santana, owner of the Stone Pony in Asbury Park. ''My sound man freaked out because of the heat and everything, and they jeopardized the health and the safety of our patrons.''
Concert organizers also said Great White used pyrotechnics during a Feb. 7 show at the Pinellas Park Expo Center near Tampa, Fla., and a Feb. 13 show in Allentown, Pa., without discussing it with promoters or the venue.
The Rhode Island show was part of a nationwide tour. Officials at other clubs said Great White asked before using pyrotechnics and complied when they were turned down. One of those venues was the Oxygen Nightclub in Evansville, Ind., where the band played Feb. 3.
The club has ceilings 20 feet tall ''but we still did not want to take the chance,'' club owner JJ Parson said. ''We said we'd prefer they not, and they went along. Everything we asked them to do, they'd do.''
The governor criticized use of the pyrotechnics, saying it was unwise given the age of the building and the low ceilings inside. ''I would say that using pyrotechnics inside that building you were asking for trouble,'' Carcieri said.
Nearly 190 people were taken to hospitals in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, with burns, broken bones and complications from smoke inhalation. The ages of the victims ranged from the teens to the late 30s.
The governor praised rescue workers for their professionalism at the emotional scene.
''Every time they bring someone out, they stop, take off their helmets, with the chaplain and they are praying over each individual person,'' Carcieri said.
The worst nightclub fire in the United States came on Nov. 28, 1942, when 492 people died at Boston's Cocoanut Grove nightclub when they couldn't get out of blocked and poorly marked exits.
Early Monday, 21 people were killed and more than 50 were injured in the Chicago melee, which began after a security guard used pepper spray to break up a fight. Mourners started burying those victims Friday.
AP-NY-02-21-03 2246EST
Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. |
| CPPJames |
Posted - 02/21/2003 : 2:55:33 PM
It's a damn shame. Sad thing is, at least in the stampede incident, if people had just been slightly more calm, things might have been alright. The behavior of people in crowds (riots, stampedes, etc.) is extremely interesting. I once read a book on how crowds react, it was really really interesting. I wish I had the name of it. |
| Fluffy |
Posted - 02/21/2003 : 2:48:46 PM
Nightclub where 21 died had been ordered to close, authorities say
02:47 PM EST Feb 21
SHARON COHEN
CHICAGO (AP) - It was a chaotic scene: Hundreds of screaming people stumbling down the darkened stairs of an illegally operated nightclub, gasping for air and stepping on bodies, only to find themselves trapped at the bottom trying to escape through a single exit.
At least 21 people were killed and 57 injured in the stampede early Monday at the crowded E2 nightclub, authorities said. There were reports that as many as 500 people were crammed into the second-floor club when someone sprayed Mace or pepper spray to quell a fight about 2 a.m.
A judge ordered the owners to close their second-floor club last July because of safety violations, including failure to provide enough exits, city officials said Monday. A judge had denied a request by the owners to reopen.
"The owner knows damn well that he is not to open that second-floor facility," said Fire Commissioner James Joyce. City officials said they plan to go to court as early as Tuesday to seek criminal contempt charges against the owner.
Witnesses described a frenzied scene of some people trying to climb through the ceiling, while others were trampled in the frantic rush for an exit, their faces and bodies flattened against the glass front door.
Some people fainted on the club floor; others were coughing and crying, gagging and blindly groping for any way out.
"People were being trapped underneath you . . . so we're actually standing on people's heads and we didn't even know it," said Amishoov Blackwell, a 30-year-old patron. "It was just bodies laying everywhere."
Blackwell said one man crushed between two people told him: " 'I can't breathe! I want you to hold my hand, man. If I don't make it, tell my mom that I love her!' He just basically collapsed."
Some witnesses reported that the lights were cut in the stairwell.
On Monday afternoon, Joyce backed off earlier statements that firefighters had used sledgehammers and pry bars to open other doors in the half-block-long building.
Larry Langford, a fire department spokesman, said one door was locked and another was blocked by laundry bags or other items from the first-floor Epitome restaurant.
While that would be in violation of city fire codes, it apparently didn't contribute to the deaths, as officials said the crowd surged down a single front exit in the pandemonium.
Joyce also scaled down the number of people in the club to about 500; earlier, the fire department had estimated as many as 1,500 people were on the second floor.
Joyce said that fire department inspectors visited the restaurant in October, but did not visit the nightclub because they had no reason to suspect it was open.
But the club - which was frequented by professional athletes and entertainers - has been advertised on the Internet and featured in current nightlife listings.
Police Supt. Terry Hillard said investigators were trying to sort out conflicting stories about the source of the Mace or pepper spray and obtain videotape from inside the club. Witnesses said the spray may have come from the club's security guards trying to break up a fight between at least two women.
"Lives were tragically and senselessly lost, pinned down by a stampeding crowd," Hillard said.
"We will get to the bottom of this," he said. "Right now our investigation is at full tilt."
Friends and family of missing patrons flocked to the morgue Monday afternoon, searching for information and holding out hope that their loved ones were still alive.
"I just can't understand it," said Herschel Blake, who was looking for his 22-year-old grandson, Michael. "His mother called me and said, 'Your grandson is dead. The door was locked. There was only one way out of the place.' "
Witnesses said some people were stomped on; many victims suffered crushing chest and head injuries. By Monday evening only seven of the injured remained hospitalized. Most of the dead were in their 20s or early 30s. At least nine died from multiple trauma and four from cardiac arrest, authorities said.
"Everybody smashed; people crying, couldn't breathe," said club-goer Reggie Clark. "Two ladies next to me died. A guy under me passed out."
Water and ice were passed to some of those trapped as rescuers struggled to pull them from the building.
"You could see a mound of people," said Cory Thomas, 33, who went to the club to pick up two friends. "People were stacking on top of each other, screaming and gagging, I guess from the pepper spray. The door got blocked because there were too many people stacked up against it."
"I saw them taking out a pregnant woman," Thomas said. "She was in bad shape. I saw at least 10 lifeless bodies."
The president of a Chicago entertainment agency that has booked acts at the club said access to the building was unsafe for the number of people reported to be there early Monday.
"The doorway was obviously inadequate for an emergency," said Ron Onesti of Onesti Entertainment Co. "When the place is filled to capacity, the doorway is very thin."
Photographs on Onesti's Web site depict packed crowds at the nightclub. Onesti maintained that his agency had nothing to do with managing the club and hadn't had any dealings involving it in about a year.
The club is located in the Near South Side, a commercial district near the McCormick Place convention centre.
The stampede was one of America's deadliest.
In December 1991, nine young people were crushed to death in a gymnasium stairwell while awaiting a celebrity basketball game in New York.
In December 1979, 11 people were killed in Cincinnati in a crush to get into a concert by The Who.
© The Canadian Press, 2003 |
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