Just like everyone who watched on television, the Grenfell Tower fire was a terribly sad thing to see. I was up watching when the news first broke, and I hoped and prayed that the Tower was NOT a residential block, because at around 1:30am, most people in a residential block would be sleeping, and this would be disastrous in terms of lives lost, judging by how the fire was raging.
As I continued to watch, all through the night, more details emerged that it was indeed a residential block, in Kensington. Kensington is one of the richest boroughs in the country, but then as I watched the first interviews of the survivors on television, all I saw were people of diverse ethnic backgrounds, (forgive me) some even looking like refugees. Then it started to dawn on me. This was one of those tower blocks in a rich neighbourhood, where they house poor people.
I don’t know this for a fact, but if we research the mode of payment by the occupants of that Tower, probably more than 60% would be on some type of benefit assistance. This means the payments go directly to the Owner/Landlords, regularly. What is my point? There are two types of high rise buildings in London; The Condominiums and the so called “Tower Blocks”. Both types of high rises may have same number of floors, maybe 25 or 30. But while a Condo is full of well to do occupants, probably each unit is owned, the Block is mostly full of tenants who are claiming some sort of housing benefit.
So let me take a stab at saying that if the Grenfell Tower was a Condo, it would have fire prevention sprinklers! Simple! but no, the 27 floor tower that was engulfed by a raging fire in about 30 minutes did NOT have sprinklers, WHY?! In 21st Century London, how can a 27 floor building, anywhere, not have sprinklers, when the fire trucks can only shoot up water up to 12th or 14th floor? WHY?!
The answer to my WHY is this building was full of people who don’t matter. This building was mostly occupied by people who are not worth bothering about. This building was mostly occupied by people who are begging for help, and you know beggars can’t be choosers. This building housed a collection of people from different parts of the world who are in Britain as a burden on the country, so they should be grateful and not complain. From what we’ve been hearing about this building, the residents have been complaining to the Landlords for years about how unsafe the building was in case of fire, but nothing has been done. Also, just last year of thereabouts the building got a “facelift”. The building was fitted with what is called “cladding” (reportedly at the cost of millions) which beautified the building on the outside (after all it is in Kensington, the richest borough in the country), but inside the building there are no sprinklers in case of fire. There are reports that this cladding even contributed to the rapid spread of the fire because of the materials it was made of. Wow!
Just as the fire was raging that early morning, I tweeted something about my uneasiness at most of the survivors (and occupants) being from diverse ethnic backgrounds, but I deleted it because I didn’t want to pre-empt any thoughts of arson or prejudice. That would be irresponsible of me. But now, knowing more about this building, I cannot but think that the Landlords have been grossly irresponsible relating to the fire safety of this building. Any fire is a terrible thing to happen at any time, but a fire that could have been put out quickly but for poor fire safety is even worse.
I don’t want to make anything out of this tragedy, but EVERY life is important. Everyone in that building deserved to have a chance to survive that fire, but without sprinklers those people didn’t have a chance. So I guess this burning question of WHY would continue to ring in our ears for years to come.
May the souls of those who perished rest in peace.