Spotted at Stratford City on my way over to Forest Gate police station yesterday afternoon.
Car on fire apparently.
Flames were at least twice as high by time bus arrived.
Pales into insignificance compared to Latimer Road though-that looks horrendous.
The whole tower block has gone, burnt to the ground, Does not look good, people trapped and unable to escape.
Horrific scene - dread to think what the death toll will be.
Prescient & tragic
1 Like
That is just awful. If it is true (and I see no reason why it shouldnāt be) then the KCTMO should be taken to the top of one of their towers and be made to jump.
Words fail me at the moment. Heartbreaking eyewitnesses accounts.
Staggering incident. it sounds like a management failing -If true perpetrators must be held to full account
I heard on the radio today that National Grid had recently installed gas mains in the block. They were installed in the stairwell (ie the fire escapeā¦) for the whole height of the building and NG were supposed to box them in to make them fire-proof, but they never didā¦
What a terrible tragedy.
That is utterly horrific if it turns out to be the case.
When the Met Police say they are hoping the death toll will be less than a hundred you know the total is going to be very high. The enormity of the loss of life at Grernfell Tower is yet to hit home but it is obvious that it will rank as among the worse loss of life in my lifetime.
As for May, she makes George Bush look to be a shining example of humanity, shame on her!
I notice that certain elements of the press (no prizes for guessing which) are blaming green imperatives regarding insulation for this fire. Not considering that the more flammable option was chosen because it would save a few quid. As someone wrote yesterday, this is what the Conservativesā āvisionā as outlined in their manifesto, of cutting through red tape looks like. Unfortunately red tape is often there for good reasons.
1 Like
Amazingly, the usually insufferably dull George Monbiot gets this very right in this piece from The Grauniad:
The key phrase being that āself-regulation stands in relation to regulation the way self-importance stands in relation to importanceā.
2 Likes
Interesting angle on regulation v self regulation for a newspaper to takeā¦
Whilst both methodologies have some merit, the risk based approach to design and safety trumps both. My concern would be that Parliament will want to be seen to be doing something, will introduce some new regulations and think the job is done.
unfortunately a regulatory approach is often only as good as the last incident that changed it. A risk based approach, particularly in relation to fire safety, may well be preferable. I hope this is considered in the mix and we donāt just get the usual knee jerk reaction.
I was talking in the light of Levesonā¦
Apologies, meant to quote htm rather than you.
I see the Queen managed to visit people affected by this, no mention of security issues on that front then.
Her Majesty was highly unlikely to have to face an angry mob who would hurl abuse and possibly get unruly or violent, whereas May would have.
So while I donāt sympathise with her you can understand why the security advice was to keep her out of the way so that the fire brigade and police could get on with the important work without having a potential riot on their hands.
Not sure why she went at all really, all it has done has made her seem even more out of touch. Her new advisors are clearly no improvement on the two who got blamed for the election disaster.
I would take the view that May should have met the victims, as did Khan, Corbyn, Her Maj & Co, and Andrea Leadsome (this weekās dedicated human shield for May by the looks of it). If you want to lead, you should be prepared to cop the abuse when people are angry and deal with it. Anything else at best looks weak and at worst looks uncaring and grossly incompetent.
Gavin Barwell made himself look like an utter twat this morning too. I acknowledge that May is very unlucky to have chosen him just days before this appalling tragedy.
2 Likes
Verbal abuse is one thing but if it got out of hand and turned violent (which it could easily have done) then that would have had serious implications for the work the fire brigade and poilce on site were doing. Doubt we will ever know whether she asked to go privately or whether it was on the advise of the police/security service.
I didnāt see any evidence of physical threats to any other politicians or official visitors. Some media folk got into bother for being insensitive about victimās grief. I canāt see a visit from Mrs May being of much comfort to the victims, but that is just meā¦ Ignoring them was only going to cause more suffering. If she was advised not to meet the victims she might have either refused the advice or chosen not to show up. To do anything else, like inspect the disaster site and rescue teams in front of the cameras (as an example) is mind bogglingly insensitive.