Ruins of Thai Nightclub Examined After New Year's Fire Kills 59
A Thai woman mourns after finding the name of a family member on the list of those killed in the club fire.
(By Apichart Weerawong -- Associated Press)
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Friday, January 2, 2009
BANGKOK, Jan. 1 -- Police and firefighters picked through the ruins of a popular nightclub in the Thai capital Thursday morning trying to determine the cause of a blaze that killed at least 59 revelers and injured 200 others celebrating the first minutes of the new year.
Hours earlier, television footage showed injured Thais and foreigners fleeing the flaming shell of the upmarket Santika nightclub. Police Gen. Jongrak Jutanont said that foreigners were among the dead and that nationals of Australia, Japan, Nepal and the Netherlands had been injured.
Witnesses said the blaze broke out just after midnight, possibly sparked by fireworks set off inside the building, where about 1,000 people were gathered.
Rescuers, delayed by Bangkok's traffic, did what they could even as the fire continued to rage. It took firefighters three hours to control the blaze.
Police said that although they believe some victims were killed by the fire, many others were suffocated or trampled in the stampede for the exit.
Most people tried to squeeze out of the lone front door. There was another exit at the back of the building, but regular patrons said that they had never known about it and that it was not well marked. The windows on the second floor of the building were covered with iron bars, contributing to the pandemonium.
On Thursday morning, police and firefighters found piles of shoes lying near the staircase leading to the door, and drinking glasses -- many shattered by the heat -- standing atop charred tables. Warped copies of a DVD titled "Goodbye Santika" were strewn about; the New Year's Eve party was the club's final event before its lease expired.
"There was only one main way to get out from the front. People who worked there were able to escape from the back because they knew the exits, but the others had no chance," said senior firefighter Wacharatpong Sri-Saard.
Many of the bodies were found on a circular dance floor in front of the stage. Rescue workers laid out rows of corpses, covered in white cloth, on the pavement outside the gutted building, in the city's central Thong Lor district, a residential area popular with Bangkok's large expatriate population.
Witnesses said at least 10 of the dead were foreigners, but it will probably take some time before the bodies can be positively identified.
After the bodies had been removed, a single bunch of white roses was placed before the fluttering police tape surrounding the building, a mute memorial to one of the victims, a 34-year-old teacher from England.
