It happened with the tragedy of the Murcia nightclubs (13 dead) and history repeats itself now with the drama (three children and their mother dead) of the deadly fire in Vigo. These innocent victims have lifted the rug under which administrations usually hide their shame and although all deaths hurt the same, no one escapes the fact that the suffering due to the loss of a loved one is multiplied when one comes to the conviction that this death would have occurred. could have been avoided.
In Murcia, some nightclubs without valid licenses and with a closure order that no one cared to execute, became a mousetrap for the 13 customers burned by the fire on a night of partying. If the City Council had cared to apply the rule, those premises would have been closed and these people would be alive today.
In Vigo, much of the same. If the City Council and the authorities had been more attentive to the conflicts and problems in a four-story building on Alfonso , 12, and 14 years old and their mother Roxana, 30, would also be alive today.
These minors and that woman will not be able to contemplate this Christmas the light show that the mayor, Abel Caballero, boasts so much about, who yesterday visited the area of the tragedy and who will now have to explain (also the Xunta) why no action was taken sooner to rescuing those minors from a squatted building that everyone or almost everyone knew was a dangerous mousetrap.
The accumulation of misery and nonsense, just as it was already uncovered when the carpet of the 13 dead in Murcia was lifted, also blushes in the deadly tragedy of the Vigo fire.
The most evident and confessed abandonment of political functions by the Council itself is that the three minors who died yesterday morning were already under the focus of the administration. This is confirmed by the Councilor for Social Policy, Yolanda Aguiar: “We knew the family, it has an open social history” and the guardianship service for minors of the Xunta de Galicia was also aware of this reality.
Why weren't they taken out of that hell, if they knew it and were aware of the serious risks? Because those politicians will not be able to say that the drama has taken them by surprise.
They had the report from the Firefighters, who had already gone to that building on several occasions due to arson. They were aware that, in those apartments, most of them squatted and with children, there was no electricity or running water.
The authorities were aware, it could not be otherwise, of the existence of police reports for quarrels, fights, drug dealing, attacks on neighbors on that street... carried out by those tenants who lived in almost inhumane conditions in a building without any measures. security and in apartments that would not pass the most lenient habitability control.
And there they were still, despite so many red lights that announced this tragic chronicle, many families with young children, the most innocent in this story.
And as if this long list of possible political negligence were not enough, the Voice of Galicia reveals that on the night of the fire at the Vigo Fire Station, the minimum number of firefighters required by law was not met. Add and continue.
Another thing that will have to be demonstrated, with evidence, is whether that reduced crew of firefighters took longer to reach the burning building than would be reasonable. It is another complaint from neighbors and survivors, which this emergency body denies by assuring that the first vehicles arrived at that property minutes after receiving the first notice, after 4 in the morning.
The Scientific Police will now have to determine the origin of the deadly fire. The first hypotheses point as the point of origin to a dilapidated light box (which would not pass even the slightest inspection) on the ground floor.
The flames spread to a motorcycle - suspected stolen - and from there they caught the large amount of belongings and garbage accumulated in that area. The narrow staircase acted as a chimney and the fire became a death trap for Roxana and her three children, who lived on the fourth floor. Her father and another daughter, 8 years old, were saved after waiting hanging from a window for 15 minutes for the arrival of a fire ladder.
The police thesis, still preliminary, about the origin of the first spark still does not convince the majority of the residents of the property. These people are convinced that the fire was arson.
And they point to a culprit: a problematic tenant of the building, expelled by other inhabitants of the building. When that man left – at the moment there is no evidence that he has been located or detained – he shouted so that everyone could hear: “This is not going to be the last. If I don't live here, no one lives."
The alleged negligence due to neglect of duties, if in the end it is proven that the fire was accidental, would have to make people blush even more, since the excuse that the situation was caused by a human hand that wanted to cause maximum damage will no longer be valid.
If the flames originated accidentally due to a short circuit, the feeling that these four deaths could have been avoided, with more diligent authorities, increases.
