c.a. said:
Kemerovo shopping mall fire most likely caused by arson — source
March 28, 13:39
http://tass.com/society/996493
Just a guess, I would say -
Arson might be a high probability on the list considering Exits were locked and the alarm and smoke ventilation system were out of service?
Alleged VIDEO Captures Moment Deadly Fire Engulfed Russian Shopping Center
https://sputniknews.com/russia/201803261062905547-video-deadly-fire-engulf-mall/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODIbteOBloQ (0:36 min.)
A fire that has claimed the lives of at least 64 people, most of them children, broke out in the Russian shopping mall “Winter Cherry” in the Siberian city of Kemerovo on March 25. Officials warn that the number of victims may still climb. The cause of the fire has not yet been determined.
Footage, allegedly depicting the first minutes of the fire has emerged on the "112" YouTube channel. The fire as it rapidly spreads across the children's playground, with many parents hastily grabbing their children and rushing through the corridor can be seen on the video. Both the playground and the corridor are filled with black smoke in a matter of seconds.
Witnesses report that the fire alarm didn't go off. The high number of casualties may have been caused by the ensuing panic that drove many people through narrow corridors in a movie theater and near the children's playground, which were quickly engulfed with black smoke.
The
fire erupted on the top floor of the Zimnyaya Vishnya (or Winter Cherry) on Sunday March 25th. The next day,
flames engulfed the rooftop of a condominium in the Chechen city of Grozny.
I wonder, if a drone was used to drop something on top of the building that started the fire?
Major Fire Breaks Out on Condo Rooftop in Chechnya (PHOTOS, VIDEO)
https://sputniknews.com/russia/201803271062928092-grozny-chechnya-fire/
The rooftop of a condominium in the Chechen city of Grozny became engulfed in flames Monday, prompting the evacuation of more than 200 people.
According to Russian media reports, the fire was said to have spread across 300 square meters, which appear on photos to be the building's entire rooftop.
Some 155 firefighters, 14 vehicles and 44 various pieces of equipment were dispatched to the scene; the firefighters managed to extinguish the flame a couple hours ago.
"The fire has been extinguished, the spread of fire has been prevented," says Chechnya Emercom head Ruslan Yakhyaev. "The fire area was 300 square meters. The apartments sustained no damage."
Yakhyaev said that the flats will be thoroughly inspected; after that, the people would be either allowed to return to their homes or will be temporarily put in nearby hotels. According to preliminary reports, no one was injured in the fire.
The incident happens just one day after another major fire broke out in the Siberian city of Kemerovo that took lives of at least 64 people, including many children.
Add these recent reports:
Some 100 staff and visitors were evacuated from the burning car dealership; no injuries have been reported in the accident.
Car Dealership Catches Fire in St Petersburg, All Safe (VIDEO) Wednesday 28.03.2018
https://sputniknews.com/russia/201803281062993007-car-dealership-fire-saint-petersburg-russia/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0tap8SIE54 (1:28:31 min.)
The video shows a thick plume of black smoke emanating from the building of Hyundai car dealership in Russia's Saint Petersburg.
According to preliminary information, the area of the fire amounts to 500 square meters and about 100 people were evacuated. News about the burning building prompted an alarm in social media, as today Russia is mourning the victims of another fire, which occurred in a Kemerovo shopping mall on March 25 and claimed the lives of 64 people.
A passenger plane that was preparing to fly from Moscow to Novosibirsk was filled with smoke on a runway at Domodedovo airport.
WATCH: Passenger Plane Filled With Smoke Evacuated at Moscow Airport (Video) Wednesday 28.03.2018
https://sputniknews.com/russia/201803281062974337-plane-evacuation-moscow/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBp8U4RHCQc (0:51 min.)
According to the available data from Rosaviatsia, the interrupted take-off of the Boeing 737-800 aircraft took place after a take-off run of 1 km. During the take-off, the crew reported a smoke in the cabin. The plane stopped within the runway, emergency evacuation of passengers was completed successfully.
The commission of Rosaviatsia will find out the reasons for the interrupted take-off of the S7 aircraft in Domodedovo.
The journalists were driving to one of the malls in the Russian city of Vladimir for an inspection in wake of the deadly fire in the "Winter Cherry" shopping center in Kemerovo, which claimed dozens of lives.
Bus With Journalists Catches Fire on Route in Russia (VIDEO) Wednesday 28.03.2018
https://sputniknews.com/russia/201803281062983541-bus-russia-journalists-fire/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG-vcNUPkRo (1:01 min.)
When smoke suddenly clouded the bus, all the journalists left the vehicle and the driver began to extinguish the fire. No one was hurt in the incident.
The bus was provided to journalists by the local department of the Russian emergencies ministry, as today inspection raids are being conducted in Russia after a major fire in the shopping center "Winter Cherry" in Kemerovo killed 64 people, mostly children.
According to the emergencies ministry official,
the incident is likely to be caused by a circuit, which could occur in any car. Another bus was immediately sent to pick up the journalists, who will continue with their check of shopping malls in the city.
On Sunday, a major fire broke out at the Zimnyaya Vishnya ("Winter Cherry") shopping center in the Russian city of Kemerovo. The bodies of all 64 victims have been recovered, among them 41 children. On March 28, Russia is holding a nation-wide day of mourning.
Following the fire, the country's General Prosecutor's Office launched inspections of shopping centers across the country, aimed to check their fire safety.
President Vladimir Putin flew to the scene of a deadly shopping mall fire in Siberia that killed 64 people and promised angry residents on Tuesday that those responsible for what he called criminal.
Putin, amid emotional scenes at fatal fire scene, pledges action as anger mounts Tuesday 27 March 2018
http://www.arabnews.com/node/1274211/world
The fire, at the Winter Cherry mall in the city of Kemerovo, killed 41 children, according to the Interfax news agency, and the calamitous way it was handled has stirred anger and focused attention on corruption and lax fire safety standards.
Putin, re-elected only this month, laid flowers at a memorial to the victims in the coal-producing region about 3,600 km (2,200 miles) east of Moscow, before chairing a meeting and declaring a national day of mourning be held on Wednesday. “What’s happening here? This isn’t war, it’s not an unexpected methane explosion at a coal mine. People came to relax, children. We’re talking about demography and losing so many people,” Putin angrily told officials.
“Why? Because of some criminal negligence, because of slovenliness. How could this ever happen?,” he added. “The first emotion when hearing about the number of dead and dead children is not to cry but to wail. And when you listen to what has been said here, speaking honestly, other emotions arise.”
Investigators said fire exits had been illegally blocked, the public address system had not been switched on, the fire alarm system was broken, and children had been locked inside cinemas.
The fire swept through the upper floors of the shopping center, where a cinema complex and children’s play area were located, on Sunday afternoon.
Hundreds of angry protesters, many of them crying, gathered in central Kemerovo. The mayor, Ilya Seredyuk, tried to speak, but his words were often drowned out by chants calling on him to resign.
“Why don’t they tell us the truth?,” shouted one protester.
Many locals do not believe the official death toll of 64 and suspect that hundreds of people were killed in the blaze and that a cover-up is underway, something Putin has flatly denied.
Relatives of the victims say they have compiled a list of 85 people, most of them children, who are still missing.
Opposition leader Alexei Navalny called on people to attend a protest event later on Tuesday in Moscow.
RAW ANGER - Public anger in Kemerovo was reflected in protesters’ placards. “How many victims are there really,?” read one, while another suggested corrupt officials had taken a bribe to sign off on the mall’s fire safety. “Vova and Aman to prison!” read another banner, referring to Putin and the local governor.
One senior regional official, Sergei Tsivilev, got down on his knees to apologize to the crowd.
Natalia and Sergei Agarkov, whose two children were killed in the tragedy along with their grandmother stood on the square holding photographs of their dead loved ones.
“Masha was 10, Kostya was eight,” Sergei told Reuters. “Masha ... was really good at sport. She should have ran out, but everything was locked. I identified them yesterday. I didn’t see Kostya, but recognized him by his little boots.”
Alexander Bastrykin, head of Russia’s Investigative Committee, which handles major crimes, told Putin the fire alarm system in the mall had been out of order since March 19 and that a security guard had not turned on the public address system to warn people to evacuate the building.
He said five people had already been detained, including the owners and lessees of outlets inside the mall.
Replying to Putin, Bastrykin said: “Most of the staff ran away and left children and parents and their children to their fate.” “Those workers who should have been responsible for people’s safety, for organizing an evacuation, they were the first to run away,” he said.
“Serious violations (of the law) took place when the mall was being built and when it was functioning. The fire exits were blocked,” Svetlana Petrenko, a spokeswoman for the investigative committee, said in a statement.
She said investigators, who have opened a criminal investigation into the blaze, were looking into other possible violations too.
Emergency services said they had extinguished the blaze, but later said it had reignited in places, and that rescuers were struggling to recover bodies beneath smoldering rubble.
It was unclear if any people were still unaccounted for. Veronika Skortsova, the health minister, said from the scene that 11 people were in hospital, including an 11-year-old boy who was in a serious condition. Russian media said the boy had leapt from a window and that both his parents had been killed.
Earlier erroneous reports about hundreds of people allegedly perishing in the deadly shopping mall fire in Russia turned out to be originating from a lone Ukrainian prankster.
Ukrainian Phone Prankster Spreads Fake News About Deadly Siberia Mall Fire
https://sputniknews.com/russia/201803281062975746-phone-prankster-fake-news/
A Russian Investigative Committee spokeswoman told journalists that
the agency managed to "identify a foreign national who deliberately spread false information about the number of victims of the fire in Kemerovo in an attempt to destabilize the situation in the region."
Earlier a Ukrainian phone prankster known as Evgeny Volnov posted an audio recording on his Youtube channel, featuring him calling morgues in Kemerovo and, posing as an EMERCOM official, inquiring about the availability of "free room" there.
When the employees at the first morgue he called told Volnov that their facility could accommodate no more than 100 bodies, he told them that they’re about to receive "over 300 corpses", prompting the shocked morgue employees to reply that according to the information available to them the number of Kemerovo fire victims ranges from 60 to 70.
Volnov’s phone calls resulted in him "misleading the relatives of the dead and injured," the Investigative Committee representative said, adding that the prankster’s actions will be subjected to a thorough legal assessment.
On Sunday, March 25, a fire broke out in the Zimnyaya Vishnya ("Winter Cherry") shopping center in the Siberian city Kemerovo. According to the Russian Emergencies Ministry, a total of 64 people were killed in the tragic incident, including 41 children. The Kemerovo Region declared a three-day mourning period while Russian President Vladimir Putin declared a day of national mourning on Wednesday.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that attempts to fuel animosity and to spread panic over the Kemerovo tragedy by circulating false reports in social networks are unacceptable.
Putin Speaks on Kemerovo Tragedy: Spreading Fake News Around It 'Unacceptable'
https://sputniknews.com/russia/201803281062996643-putin-kemerovo-tragedy/
"We see that, unfortunately, false reports are being disseminated through social networks, including from abroad, in order to spread panic… and fuel animosity among people," Putin said at a meeting with the head of Russia's Investigative Committee Alexander Bastrykin and Health Minister Veronika Skvortsova to discuss the measures taken to eliminate the consequences of the tragedy and to investigate its causes.
The president went on saying that the investigation of the fire should be objective and transparent.
"The investigation should be as objective as possible, as usual, but it should be as transparent as possible in this case… Of course, all versions must be checked," Putin told the Investigative Committee head Alexander Bastrykin and Health Minister Veronika Skvortsova, who presented a report to the president on the measures taken to eliminate the consequences of the tragedy and to investigate its causes.
Putin stressed it was very important for everyone to understand that the investigation will draw conclusions based on the norms of the law, and regardless of any official position of any of the people involved in this tragedy.
Putin also instructed Bastrykin to meet with the victims of the fire and the relatives of the deceased and to avoid any delays of the investigation.
Listen to what they think, listen to how they see the development of this situation in order to use it during the preliminary investigation," the president said.
In turn, Bastrykin stated that the examination would be independent, extra-departmental, along with the expertise of the Investigative Committee.
On Sunday, a fire broke out in the Zimnyaya Vishnya ("Winter Cherry") shopping center in Kemerovo. According to the Russian Emergencies Ministry, 64 people, including many children, were killed in the tragic incident. The Kemerovo Region declared a three-day mourning period, while Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree declaring Wednesday a day of national mourning.
Charges Connected With the Case -
Meanwhile, a court in the Siberian city of Kemerovo on Wednesday arrested Nadezhda Suddenok, the manager of the Zimnyaya Vishnya shopping mall in the Russian city of Kemerovo, where 64 people died in a huge fire, a Sputnik correspondent reported from a courtroom.
"To order a detention of Suddenok for one month and 29 days until May 25," a judge said.
The defendant said she would appeal the ruling.
The court is now expected to issue rulings for other defendants in the case, including a technical director of a company that owns the shopping mall and a security guard, who, according to the Russian Investigative Committee, turned off the public address system in the shopping center.
Fire Safety Checks - Speaking about fire safety checks at the shopping mall later in the day, head of the Russian Investigative Committee Alexander Bastrykin stated that they were likely to have been carried out improperly.
We are focusing on the responsible supervisory structures and bodies, how they carried out regular checks since the mall opened… There are reasons to believe that this was done, to put it mildly, in an improper way," Bastrykin said.
The Investigative Committee is studying all the documents signed between supervisory bodies and the Zimnyaya Vishnya mall's management, Bastrykin noted. He went on to add that investigators were also working with the city’s administration, focusing on officials responsible for issuing permits for the mall’s use.
"We are questioning them," Bastrykin added, in reference to these officials.
