An ocean of time after losing their mothers, many disoriented or sick elderly people cry out to them when they see the end near, as anyone who has visited hospitals and nursing homes knows. This cry (“Mama, mama!”) that unites the end and the beginning of life echoed in the hell of Murcia. “We will die; mom, I love you”, was the last audio that a victim sent to his family.
She was a 28-year-old Ecuadorian woman who lived in the neighboring town of Caravaca de la Cruz. She traveled with her boyfriend and a group of friends to the Murcia capital to spend the night at Fonda Milagros, which is very frequented by the region's Latin American community. Jairo, the young woman's father, listened to the audio dozens of times in front of the press yesterday, in a gesture of desperation. He didn't know anything about his daughter or her friends.
“There is the car they came with. It's from a friend who doesn't drink. His parents don't know anything about him either," said Jairo, whose head was hammered by a message of love and despair. “We will die; mommy, I love you". La Fonda Milagros, from where the fire spread to the adjoining premises, could remain open until 7 a.m. and many people still wanted to party at their celebrations and birthday parties.
One of these birthdays was that of Eric Hernández, from Nicaragua, who celebrated his 30th birthday with about twenty friends and relatives (among them, his mother and his brother, Marta and Sergio), almost all of them from his same nationality, except for Jon, the husband of his cousin Tania, from Ecuador. Most of the victims are from this group: the aforementioned and Rafa, Glòria, Orfilia del Carmen... The flames caught them by surprise on the top floor of the nightclub.
Smoke, screams, darkness. The short circuit left the room in darkness. This and the speed with which the fire spread turned this part of the premises into a mess. Someone shouts "light it up there", while Jairo's daughter recorded her last audio (a gesture reminiscent of those who made many victims of the Twin Towers planes of 9/11, who also had the presence of mind to call loved ones and say goodbye).
The chronicles will say that they were part of the Latino community. A half truth. Most arrived in Murcia more than 17 years ago and, given their age, had spent more than half of their lives here, or had matured here. Murcians from America, like Walter Hernández, another of Eric's cousins, the birthday boy. He was saved by a miracle because chance wanted the tragedy to surprise him on the ground floor, very close to the exit.
When he saw Jordan, another of his relatives, Walter wanted to believe that they had all left and would be home. But he went to his house and there was no one there, so he went back to the club area, waiting for news. "We don't know anything, we don't know anything", he repeated, when the psychologists took him to a nearby sports hall, where the authorities installed family support units.
They were gardeners, masons, waiters, carers of the elderly or deliverymen, like Eric himself, who works in the distribution of Coca-Cola. Young people and workers, all between the ages of 20 and 40. There were many people. Those downstairs were able to leave, but those upstairs... Until 1996, places like this closed at five in the morning, but in January 2013 the opening hours were extended. On this date, nightclubs and dance halls were allowed to be open "from Thursday to Saturday and the eve of public holidays" until seven in the morning.
The writer Alejandro Palomas explains that mothers tell their children that they know them very well because they have given birth to them, and it is the other way around: it is the children who know their mothers very well, because they have seen their blood constellations from the inside . Perhaps this explains why a passenger on board a plane about to crash or a customer in a burning disco have the imperious need to say for the last time: "Mommy, I love you".
