Fire in Loop Street May 15, 2009
Posted by baldricman in News.Tags: backpacker, burn, cape town, fire, loop street, waterkant
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Well this morning on my way to work, in amongst the inordinately high number of incidents on the traffic report, was a small piece on a fire in Loop street. It sounded at the time like it was a Backpackers, but I wasn’t paying too much attention as I didn’t register (in my pre-coffee haze) that it was right outside our offices. (I will try confirm the building shortly – UPDATE: Two Oceans Backpackers lodge)
So a chunk of Loop street was blocked off, but when I eventually got upstairs into the office, I managed to take a few pictures of the aftermath. Unfortunately, I only had my uber-crappy phone-camera for the task, and so most of the pictures are, well, uber-crappy, and rather boring. I’ve included the best (yes, I know…) below.
I’ll update this when I can find some more information out. All I know is that the building looks pretty much gutted (in my professional rubber-necker’s opinion), and I saw at least one poor sod walking around barefoot in just t-shirt and shorts. (I’m making the assumption he was involved, as he looked a tad shell-shocked). I’ve also just heard, very sadly, that there have been a number of fatalities, but again, I don’t know any further details.
Some of you may remember or be aware of the recent fire at the Touchstone Building just down the road, roughly two weeks ago. There is a good set of photos here if you are interested. These were taken with a real camera… A news article about the fire can be found here at The Times.
**UPDATES
Ok, some details have been cleared up by the article News24 have just published, over here. Tragically 4 guests were killed, and 7 injured. (They say “at least 4″, and I’ve already heard one rumour that not all guests are accounted for at this time. Lets hope that it is just a rumour…)
Deems just sent me some of the pics he took this morning… check them out. (Thanks Deems!)
photo: Demitri Baroutsos
photo: Demitri Baroutsos
photo: Demitri Baroutsos
And one more update: this news article on News24 has some interesting first-hand accounts of the blaze.
“This is Baldric, reporting for BaldricMan News” – well done mate for informing the rest of us via your blog and Twitter about thew fire at the backpacker’s. Last I heard it was 7 confirmed dead and 1 still unaccounted for.
hehe thanks Deems. Couldn’t believe it when I saw it. My first reaction was “damn, wish I’d been here for the exciting parts, to get some photos”…. but then you hear about the people who have died, and the morbid excitement quickly evaporates and reality sets in.
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