The fire in the Russian shopping center killed more than 60 people and 200 animals: what happened

On Sunday afternoon, the Winter Cherry mall in Kemerovo caught fire, the fire continued all night. At least 64 people became victims of fire. Firefighters were able to penetrate all premises only 12 hours after the start of the fire.

The investigative committee announced that an employee of the private security company of the Zimnyaya Chery shopping center in Kemerovo had turned off the warning system when it received a fire signal. The ministry added that "the issue is being resolved" about the detention of this guard, whose name is not given. Where is the guard, the UK did not specify.

The fire killed 200 animals of the contact zoo, which was located on the third floor of the building. The animals most likely suffocated in the smoke. The director was the last to leave the zoo's premises, there was strong smoke in the room, panic started - he could not save the animals physically.

What happened

The fire in the Winter Cherry shopping and entertainment center located in Kemerovo began around 12 in the morning Moscow Time (04: 00 in New York). The fire began to spread on the fourth floor, where the children's entertainment center, a skating rink and three cinema halls are located, writes RBC.

A fire engulfed the area around 1500 square. m. As a result, after a few hours there was a collapse of the roof in the area of ​​1200 square. m inside the center, between the third and fourth floors collapsed floor. Peter Cambur, senior officer of the department for organizing information to the population of the Russian Emergencies Ministry, told RBC that the city’s operational services had evacuated about 200 people from the shopping center.

“The fire was assigned the third — the highest — level of complexity,” the duty officer said.

In the evening, 25 in March, the Emergencies Ministry reported that the fire was extinguished, but a few hours later, on the third floor of the shopping and entertainment center, open fire centers appeared again.

Fire extinguishing in the shopping center was complicated by the fact that the fire spread to the inter-wall insulation, which has increased flammability, a source in the central regional center of the Emergency Ministry told RBC.

"In places difficult to extinguish, they attracted robotic complexes," said the source.

By three o'clock in the morning local time (around 20: 00 in New York), 37 died in the operational headquarters. Also relatives and friends turned to the rescuers, who said that they could not communicate with the missing people - all of them, according to the rescuers, are 64 people, 41 of them are children. In the preliminary lists of missing more than 20 children from 3 to 12 years.

Among the missing, almost the entire 5 "A" class is school number 1 in the village of Treschevsky, Kemerovo Region, reports "MK", ​​citing a source in the local administration. At the same time, the rescuers found the dead 13 in the cinema hall in the shopping center. Among the victims in the regional administration was called 11-year-old relative of the governor Aman Tuleyev.

Later, the director of the school №1 of the village of Treshchevsky, in a conversation with RBC, confirmed that there were students of this school in the burnt down shopping center. The school has a commission.

By Monday morning, rescuers found the bodies already 56 dead. More than 30 people asked for medical care, clarified in the investigative committee of Russia. Ten people were hospitalized, the rest were able to go home.

Such a number of victims could have arisen due to violations in the equipment of detours and emergency exits - here the authorities discovered many violations, said Vladimir Chernov, deputy governor of the Kemerovo region, told TASS. “The question is also why the doors [to the cinema] were closed,” he said.

According to the information posted on the official page of the contact zoo in "In contact with", they contained rabbits, guinea pigs, dwarf cameroon goats, guinea fowls, African hedgehogs, eared hedgehogs, tortoises, minipigi, arctic foxes, meerkats, squirrels, foxes, hamsters, wavy parrots and chinchillas.

A source familiar with the investigation materials told RBC that an automatic fire extinguishing system did not work in the shopping center during a fire.

“The evacuation of people was not carried out, the visitors of the center left it on their own,” the source told RBC. Visitors to the center also complained that the alarm did not work there and there was no warning of a fire.

Chernov, Vice-Governor of the region, confirmed that the building didn’t activate the alarm and warning system. The authorities and investigators have many questions to the owners of the shopping center, he noted.

Versions of the cause of the fire

The Investigation Committee of Russia in the Kemerovo region opened a criminal case in connection with a fire that caused human casualties. Investigators interrogated witnesses and eyewitnesses of the incident, and also established the owners and tenants of the premises of the shopping center and seized the documentation. The report of the TFR states that the investigating authorities "will not only establish the causes of the fire, but also give a fundamental legal assessment of the actions of the representatives of the shopping complex, as well as of the officials responsible for ensuring fire safety in it".

“The preliminary version that someone from the kids had a lighter. The ignition began with foam rubber in the trampoline pool, which flared up like gunpowder, ”said Vladimir Chernov, vice-governor of the Kemerovo region, Interfax reports.

As told RBC source in the Central Regional Emergency Center, according to another preliminary version, the cause of the fire was a short circuit in the mechanism of children's amusement; this information was confirmed by a source familiar with the investigation materials. The reasons could also be violations in the installation and maintenance of electrical networks, a source in the technical supervision services told Interfax. “They could not withstand the increased load and may not have had a high degree of protection against voltage drops,” he said.

One more version appears in the investigation materials - a fire occurred as a result of the careless treatment of teenagers with fire. “The staff of the center told the investigators about the fact that the shopping center was a gathering place for local teenagers,” a source told RBC in the Central Regional Emergency Center.

Who owns the mall

According to the SPARK database, at the address: Kemerovo, ave. Lenin, 35, registered company LLC "Winter cherry Kemerovo." The CEO and owner of the company is Nadezhda Suddenok. She is also the head of the company “Business-Sport”. The official site of the shopping center is registered with this company.

According to Interfax sources, the shopping center is owned by KDV Group by billionaire Denis Shtengelov (brands “Kirieshki”, “Crisp”, “Three crusts”, etc.).

In a conversation with RBC, the businessman did not answer the direct question of whether he is the owner of Winter Cherry, but said that “work is underway” with law enforcement agencies. During the second conversation, Shtengelov said that he was outside Russia and was not ready to comment on the situation now.

Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed deep condolences to the families and friends of those killed in the fire. He instructed the Emergency Situations Minister to fly to the site of the tragedy and take all measures to properly mobilize forces and means. According to President’s Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov, additional rescue forces from Moscow and Krasnoyarsk, including robotics and unmanned aircraft, will be mobilized to help rescuers.

The president also instructed to help the families of the victims and provide them with necessary medical care. The Minister of Health, Veronika Skvortsova, instructed the specialists of federal institutions to provide the necessary assistance to regional colleagues in organizing medical assistance to the victims, the press service of the ministry said.

TC # Kemerovo #winter cherry pic.twitter.com/IKjvQNgXu5

- DynasticCosmo (@DynasticCosmo) March 25, 2018

Increased demands

According to the existing fire-technical classification of buildings, shopping centers with a cinema and a children's entertainment sector fall into the category of entertainment establishments, told RBC head of the All-Russian Research Institute of Fire Safety, Viktor Klimkin.

“There are a large number of requirements for this category of buildings. For an institution with a capacity of 150 people and an area of ​​300 square. It is necessary to equip smoke detectors, an automatic fire extinguishing system, fire extinguishers, an internal pipeline for extinguishing a fire, a smoke exhaust system, ”Klimkin said. According to him, the staff of the shopping center should know the elementary rules of fire safety and be able to use the appropriate equipment.

The expert said that special requirements are imposed on electrical equipment, in particular, on permissible voltage.

“The flammability coefficient of the finishing materials, the toxicity index of the combustion products, the smoke emission coefficient, the heat-shielding efficiency when exposed to the flame are specifically mentioned,” he added.

Often forbidden materials are used in the construction of shopping centers, for example, polystyrene foam, Klimkin says. “Cheap finishing materials will emit toxic smoke when burned,” he explains. “People on such fires die as a result of smoke poisoning.”

Damage assessment

Further operation of the Zimnyaya Chery shopping center is impossible, the vice-governor of the Kemerovo region, Vladimir Chernov, said.

“The building will definitely be more clearly understood, because all structures are subject to deformations. It is impossible to exploit this building in the future, ”said the official (quoted by TASS).

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