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 Fri Apr 15, 2005 3:45 pm Paris Hotel Fire Kills at Least 20 |
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| Quote: | By JAMEY KEATEN, Associated Press Writer
PARIS - People screamed for help and jumped from windows early Friday as a fire swept through a hotel used by the city to house needy African families. At least 20 people were killed, half of them children, officials said.
More than 50 people were injured, 11 seriously. The blaze was thought to have started in a first-floor breakfast room of the one-star Paris Opera hotel in the capital's 9th district, a popular tourist area, fire officials said.
Many of the guests were African. A statement from City Hall said 65 people had been placed in the hotel by state services, while 14 others � eight of them children � were placed there by city officials. French social services typically place people in hotels while seeking longer-term housing solutions.
The prosecutor's office opened an investigation for manslaughter, judicial officials said. "At this stage, we have no indication that it was anything but an accident," Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin said at the scene.
President Jacques Chirac labeled the fire one of Paris' "most painful catastrophes."
The fire broke out after 2 a.m., and spread quickly.
"One can imagine young children, parents without their clothes, in the middle of the night, fast asleep, smoke, cries, tears," fire services spokesman Laurent Vibert told Europe-1 radio.
At least one person sought refuge on the burning roof, yelling and waving frantically for help as flames poured from windows. A firefighter cradled an infant in his arms as he carried him to safety.
Among the injured were visitors from Canada, Portugal, Senegal, Tunisia, Ukraine and Ivory Coast, police said. They also had said some Americans were injured, but Donald Wells, the U.S. Embassy's consul general, said three student-age Americans at the hotel were not hurt.
The nationalities of the dead were not given.
"We heard a lot of screams," said Stanislas Bricage, a Frenchman evacuated from an adjacent hotel, along with about 20 high-school-age Americans who were wrapped in survival blankets but appeared unharmed. One of the Americans, who refused to give her name, said they were on a school trip from Wisconsin and Michigan and were scheduled to return home later Friday.
"We heard a lot of screams," said Stanislas Bricage, a Frenchman evacuated from an adjacent hotel along with about 20 Americans from Wisconsin.
Chakib San, who lives in an adjacent building, said he was awakened by cries of "Fire! Fire!" He said he saw three people jump from lower stories, including a woman and a child who lay motionless after hitting the ground.
"They were on the ground. They weren't moving," he said.
A woman who works in a nearby hotel brought out a ladder and together they used it to rescue a girl, San said.
The bodies of four people of African origin were found in the first-floor breakfast room where the fire is thought to have started, Vibert said.
The dead were recovered "from the road, from inside, just about everywhere," Vibert said. The bodies were brought temporarily to the Galeries Lafayette, one of Paris' busiest and most famous department stores.
The fire took more than an hour to bring under control after 250 firefighters and 50 fire engines responded.
Another spokesman, Christophe Varennes, said the building's fire safety measures had been checked as recently as a month ago.
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Associated Press writer John Leicester and Associated Press Television News producer Greg Somerville contributed to this report. |
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