The number of dead and missing persons from the fire that ravaged London tower block last week has risen to 79. Even though the public is enraged, gov
The number of dead and missing persons from the fire that ravaged London tower block last week has risen to 79. Even though the public is enraged, government has tried to show it was improving its handling of the tragedy.
Emergency services have been praised for how the fire in cadence has been handled but the local community has accused the government of a slow and inadequate response. British Prime minister, May has come under personal attack for failing to meet residents during her first visit to the site.
Recall that fire broke out last week Wednesday at the 24-storey Grenfell tower, a social housing block in Kensington, in western London, trapping residents inside as it tore through the building with terrifying speed. The cause of the fire was from a faulty fridge owned by a resident in the tower an Ethiopian named Behailu Kebede.
According to Metropolitan Police Commander Stuart Cundy, he said five of the dead had been formally identified, and it would be a slow and painstaking task to identify the others.
“I believe there are 79 people that are either dead, or missing, and sadly I have to presume are dead.”
London has come under very severe attacks since March. Besides the fire incidence, the country has been hit by three deadly attacks by militants in London and Manchester since March. The attacks and the fire have come at a particularly difficult time for Prime Minister Theresa May, who was weakened by the loss of her parliamentary majority in a June 8 election and faces arduous talks on Britain’s exit from the European Union.
Cundy became visibly upset as he described conditions in the charred Grenfell Tower, where a search and recovery operation is expected to last weeks.
“I was in there myself and went all the way to the top floor and it is incredibly hard to describe the devastation in some parts of the building,” he said, before pausing as tears welled up in his eyes. It is a truly awful reality that there may be some people that we may not be able to identify due to the intensity of the fire,” he said before pausing again to recover himself.
He added that a criminal investigation into the tower blaze would be exhaustive as 250 investigators are already looking at all criminal offenses that may have been committed.
“Whilst it will look at the how, perhaps more importantly, it will also look at why this happened,” Cundy said.
The investigation will include areas such as the construction, renovation and maintenance of the building and fire safety procedures, he said.
