A young mother who tried to flee a raging fire at her block of flats has told Sky News the fire alarms failed to go off and that an escape route gate was padlocked.
Cydney Parker, 26, described how she ran for her life while still in her pyjamas when a fire broke out at the Spectrum building in Dagenham in east London in the early hours of Monday morning.
“I’ve looked outside and seen loads of fire engines pull up….I looked through the front door and the whole corridor is covered in thick black smoke.
“We had to run and we realised that the (exterior) fire gate had been padlocked shut so we couldn’t get out.
“It felt like I was going to die then and there.
“The only way out was finding something (we could use) to jump over the fence. As we were on top of the fence, we couldn’t get down, so we were screaming at police officers to come and help us.”
“How can they cut off a fire escape?” she asked during an emotional interview with Sky News.
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The mum-of-two said she feared she had lost all of her possessions.
Multiple residents complained that no fire alarms had sounded during the emergency.
“No alarms went off,” Mrs Parker said.
“They have gone off so many times for no reason and the time we need them to go off they didn’t go off.
“That block needs to get shut down and we all need to get housed – I hope they are all as angry as me.”
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Remarkably every resident escaped the blaze and only a few needed hospital treatment.
The London Fire Brigade confirmed on Monday that there had been aware of several fire safety issues at the building before the fire.
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Work had been underway to remove non-compliant cladding on the block so scaffolding was in place around the building.
Investigators will now examine what caused the fire and look at whether more could have been done to protect residents.
Sky News tried to reach the building’s management company for comment but received no response.
By Matthew Thompson, home and political correspondent, reporting from Dagenham for Sky News
As we arrived first thing this morning, the fire was smouldering, but it was a mere shadow of the inferno that had engulfed the building a few hours before.
Many residents fled with nothing more than the clothes on their backs.
Those who have nowhere else to go have been moved to a leisure centre a mile or so away.
There, amid a mass of water bottles, foil blankets and plastic plates, families are huddled, shell-shocked, and facing an uncertain future.
Drilon Nezaj, carrying his 17-month-old daughter in his arms, told me his flat was directly above the source of the fire.
He’d been at a friend’s house for dinner when the baby had fallen asleep, so they decided to stay the night. “She saved our lives,” he said.
Another woman, Kasia, said she awoke in the night to “flames climbing up to our balcony”.
She and her partner got out, with their dog. But fighting back tears, she told me her flat is “all gone. The only thing I can think of is we’re safe. The rest can be replaced. We got out, luckily.”
The building itself has known fire safety issues.
It was in the process of having dangerous flammable cladding removed when the fire broke out.
There may well be a time for recriminations.
But for now, there are scores of people, many with young children, who need help, and somewhere to sleep.
