Survivors tell how they fled fire
2009-05-15 12:03
Cape Town - At least four people died in a blaze that ripped through a crowded boarding establishment in central Cape Town on Friday morning, Western Cape police said.
Shocked survivors told how they escaped advancing flames by jumping from upper storey windows - and how they were forced to leave screaming friends behind.
Superintendent Andre Traut said the fire broke out at 05:00 at Two Oceans Backpackers on Loop Street, which was full to capacity at the time.
He said rescue workers had found four bodies inside the gutted four-storey building, but had not moved them yet as the building was unsafe. More bodies could be hidden under the collapsed roof.
Traut said seven people were injured in the blaze, four of them seriously.
"We are awaiting the arrival of our forensic expert for arson cases to investigate the circumstances and determine the cause," he said.
"That is basic procedure because we've got people who died in the fire."
Woken by smell of smoke
Western Cape health department spokesperson Faiza Steyn said five people, all Somalians, were admitted to Somerset hospital in the city following the blaze.
One was in a critical condition with facial burns, and would be transferred to Tygerberg hospital's burns unit for further care.
One was under observation, and the other three were being treated for minor injuries and would be discharged by Friday afternoon.
Seventeen-year-old Zimbabwean schoolboy Brendon Nyoni said he had been staying at Two Oceans for three nights.
He had come down from Harare hoping to register for medicine at the University of Cape Town.
He was woken by the smell of smoke just after 04:00.
"I tried to tell people that there was fire going on," he said.
"Then there was another man on crutches: he asked me, if there is a fire, am I going to get out, because I am on crutches.
"I carried him behind my back downstairs for his safety.
"My worst nightmare is, I had another friend who was screaming my name. I could not help him: he died inside."
Nyoni, barefoot, and wearing a coat singed by heat, said he had been unable to rescue any of his possessions other than his cellphone.
"I lost my school certificates, and the bad part is that as it's Zimbabwe, you won't get another document in Zim," he said.
'She burned inside'
Mohamed Nyamakala, 33, from the Congo, said he was sleeping on the top floor of the building.
He said when he was woken by a noise he initially thought it might be a fight.
"I opened my door, I see everywhere is smoke. I tried to go down, too much fire was coming up. Nowhere to go."
He said he, another man, and a woman tried to break down a door to get access to a room with a window to jump out.
"The fire was maybe one metre from us. Five seconds, we would have been burned," he said.
Eventually they managed to break down the door, and he and the other man broke a window and jumped to the roof of the next-door building.
"The girl couldn't do it, because she's a lady," he said.
"She burned inside."
Her name was Cindy, he said.
Nyamakala, who manages a Congolese refugee band, said he had lost all his possessions, including his papers.
'Fire deliberately started'
Junior Johnson, 26, a fleamarket stall holder from Nigeria, said he was convinced the fire was deliberately started.
"Somebody put petrol there. It's not for cigarette. Cigarette cannot make fire like that," he said, shivering in his pyjamas and borrowed shoes.
He said when he woke up, the fire was burning uncontrollably, and then there had been an explosion.
"The explosion came after the fire, boom. That's what made everything confused. After the explosion the fire came with more force.
"It was too much noise. No-one could go up, no one could come down. You can't control the fire."
Johnson, who jumped to safety from a second-storey window, said he had had a friend in the building, but did not know whether he was dead or alive.
Traut said the Two Oceans was not a place where "normal tourists" stayed.
Police had raided the premises on several occasions, and made arrests for robbery, theft and drug-related charges.
"That building is not unfamiliar to the Saps in Cape Town," he said.
- SAPA