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| Oakland warehouse party fire leaves at least nine dead, fire chief says | Oakland warehouse party fire leaves at least nine dead, fire chief says |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| At least nine people were dead and 25 unaccounted for after fire broke out during a party in a warehouse in Oakland, the city’s fire chief told reporters on Saturday. A city councilman told the Guardian he expected more deaths to be confirmed. | |
| “There is a large majority of that building that has not been searched,” fire chief Teresa Deloach-Reed told reporters at an early morning press conference, adding that the building was “huge” and that its roof had collapsed, frustrating efforts to look for the injured and recover remains. | |
| “We are hoping that the number nine is what there is and that there are no more,” Deloach-Reed said, referring to those confirmed killed. “But we have not done a complete search of the building.” | |
| The chief said police did not know how the fire started. An official with the fire investigation unit told the Guardian he could not confirm the number of killed or missing. | The chief said police did not know how the fire started. An official with the fire investigation unit told the Guardian he could not confirm the number of killed or missing. |
| “The investigation is very fresh at this time,” he said. | “The investigation is very fresh at this time,” he said. |
| At the scene, city councilman Noel Gallo, who represents the district where the fire occurred, said he expected that more than nine people had died. | |
| “It seems like it was almost impossible for anybody to get out,” said Gallo. “People got trapped. They are going to start removing the bodies.” | |
| The warehouse, in Oakland’s Fruitvale neighborhood, housed studios and workplaces. A Facebook page for the party, billed as the Golden Donna 100% Silk 2016 West Coast Tour, showed 192 people planned to attend a performance by Golden Donna, a electronic music act. | The warehouse, in Oakland’s Fruitvale neighborhood, housed studios and workplaces. A Facebook page for the party, billed as the Golden Donna 100% Silk 2016 West Coast Tour, showed 192 people planned to attend a performance by Golden Donna, a electronic music act. |
| On the page, a fire inspector and friends and family of attendees tried to contact each other and account for the missing people. Mothers, fathers and siblings posted contact information to an ad hoc Google document, along with the names of their loved ones. | |
| Nearly all the people missing were in their 20s and 30s and described by their identifying features: dreadlocks or strawberry blonde hair, eye color, scars and tattoos including a keyhole, a balloon and the words “They Sleep, We Live”. | |
| Al Garcia, who owns a supply store across the street from the warehouse, said he saw two teenagers running from the building. | |
| “They were only 17 and 18 years old,” he said. “They were the last two that got out. Everybody started running, but [one] told me the smoke started over-running them.” | |
| Garcia said the youth he spoke to was distraught. “He said no one came out after them and that’s why he was crying. He knew there were people still in there.” | |
| It seemed like there was a large crowd at the event, Garcia said, based on cars parked outside. | |
| “I couldn’t believe there was that many people,” he added. “If anybody got out of there, they were lucky.” | |
| Chico Rodriguez, who lives and works near the fire, said he rushed to the scene around 1am and saw firefighters still struggling to contain the flames. | |
| “It looked like it was going out, but all the sudden it flared up again.” | |
| Rodriguez, 62, said the smoke was filling the neighborhood. | |
| “It was thick I could smell it all the way down by where I live.” | |
| People who made it out were traumatized, he added. | |
| “This woman, she started screaming and crying,” she said. “She was really distraught about the whole thing.” | |
| The fire began at about 11.30pm, police said. Oakland firefighters tweeted video of flames bursting through the roof as they struggled to contain them. They said about 50 people were inside, according to local KTVU-TV news. Deloach-Reed said the building had no sprinkler system, the East Bay Times reported. | |
| “It was too hot, too much smoke, I had to get out of there,” Bob Mule, a photographer and artist who lives at the building and suffered minor burns, told the East Bay Times. | “It was too hot, too much smoke, I had to get out of there,” Bob Mule, a photographer and artist who lives at the building and suffered minor burns, told the East Bay Times. |
| “I literally felt my skin peeling and my lungs being suffocated by smoke. I couldn’t get the fire extinguisher to work.” | |
| More than 50 firefighters worked for hours. Battalion chief Lisa Baker told the Mercury News that teams had tried to extinguish flames inside the building until structural collapses forced them back outside. | |
| One firefighter told local KRON4 news that the warehouse was “a maze” of debris, statues, artwork and corridors. Officials told KGO news, another local station, that on the second floor of the building there was “a makeshift stairwell that was made of pallets”. | |
| The fire was not under control until after 4.30am local time. |