Toll in fire at 9; rubble holds more

A man covers his face in anguish Saturday near the scene of a fi re at a converted warehouse in Oakland, Calif. Several people died, and officials said more bodies were trapped in the debris.
A man covers his face in anguish Saturday near the scene of a fi re at a converted warehouse in Oakland, Calif. Several people died, and officials said more bodies were trapped in the debris.

OAKLAND, Calif. -- Firefighters struggled to get to bodies in the rubble Saturday after a fire tore through a converted Oakland warehouse during a late-night electronic-music party, killing at least nine people and making the charred structure unsafe for emergency crews to enter.

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The New York Times

Oakland, Calif., firefighters stand on the roof of a building adjacent to the warehouse that caught fire Friday night. The warehouse roof collapsed, making it dangerous for responders to enter the building.

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AP

A woman grieves Saturday near the scene of the fire.

Officials said the death toll could rise as high as 40.

In what emergency responders described as one of the worst mass-casualty events in the city's history, some partygoers at the two-story warehouse were asphyxiated Friday night by thick black fumes, which poured from the building's windows for several hours. On Saturday, survivors stood across the street in a Wendy's parking lot, watching firefighters attempt to put out the blaze and rescue victims.

In the evening, excavators, a crane and dump trucks were being rolled in to help in the recovery, and the building was being flooded with light to allow crews to work through the night.

Alameda County sheriff's Sgt. Ray Kelly said nine bodies had been recovered and that they had been taken to the coroner's office to be identified. He added that there were more bodies trapped in the debris that were hard to reach and needed to be "cut from the wreckage."

Oakland authorities said the warehouse, which they described as "a labyrinth of artist studios," had been under investigation for several months.

Darin Ranelletti of the Oakland Planning Department said the city had received reports of people living illegally in the building, which was only permitted as a warehouse. The city opened an investigation Nov. 13, and an investigator went to the warehouse Nov. 17 but was unable to gain access to the inside of the building.

One survivor, however, said 18 artists lived inside the warehouse.

Bob Mule said he was one of the artists living in the space. He told KGO-TV that he and another person smelled smoke and spotted the fire in a back corner and started yelling.

"The fire went up really, really, really quickly," he said.

Mule said he tried to help someone who had an injured ankle but couldn't.

"There was a lot of stuff in the way, the flames were too much," Mule said, trailing off. "I hope, I hope he's OK."

Authorities said escape from the building, which had only two exits, may have been complicated because the first and second floors were linked by a makeshift staircase made of wooden pallets.

"It was just a labyrinth of little areas. We knew people were in there, and we were trying to get them out. But it was just a labyrinth," Oakland Deputy Fire Chief Mark Hoffmann told reporters Saturday afternoon.

It's unclear what sparked the fire. But officials said the clutter served as a tinderbox and there were no sprinklers.

"Something as simple as a cigarette could have started this," Kelly said.

The building, an artists' studio known as the Ghost Ship in the Fruitvale neighborhood, was the site of a show put on by a group of musicians, producers and DJs on a West Coast tour. More than 200 people had said on the show's event page on Facebook that they would attend. By Saturday, the page had turned into an emergency message board, as dozens of friends and family members posted about missing loved ones. Among the missing were some of the musicians who had been scheduled to perform.

"A lot of these people are young people," Kelly said. "They are from all parts of our community." Some of the dead may be foreigners, he said.

Images from the building's website depict a wooden studio filled with antiques, sculptures and curios. Old lamps, musical instruments, suitcases and rugs decorated the ornate space.

Responders said they arrived to find the building filled with heavy smoke and flames. Bodies were found on the second floor of the building, Chief Teresa Deloach-Reed of the Oakland Fire Department said Saturday.

"In my career of 30 years, I haven't experienced something of this magnitude," she said.

Deloach-Reed said there were "no reports of smoke alarms going off." At least two fire extinguishers were inside, she said.

The fire was still smoldering more than 12 hours after firefighters arrived just before midnight Friday, and officials were approaching the recovery efforts with extreme caution given the fragile state of the building.

One of the survivors, Aja Archuleta, 29, a musician, was scheduled to perform at the party with her synthesizers and drum machines around 1 a.m. and was working at the door when the fire broke out about 11 or 11:15 p.m.

"There were two people on the first level who had spotted a small fire that was growing quickly," she said. "It was a very quick and chaotic build, from a little bit of chaos to a lot of chaos."

She added, "I have lost 20 friends in the past 24 hours."

Kelly said few victims were hospitalized.

"It appears that people either made it out or they didn't make it out," he said.

Family members of the people who were unaccounted for expressed anguish over the hours of waiting to know if their relatives were inside.

Daniel Vega, 36, said he felt "infuriated" waiting to hear news of his 22-year-old brother, Alex, who had not been answering his phone Saturday morning. Vega said he had heard from a friend that his brother was at the party.

"Give me some gloves. I've got work shoes. I'm ready," Vega said. "Let me find my brother, that's all I want."

Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf called the fire "an immense tragedy."

"Our focus right now is on the victims and their families and ensuring that we have a full accounting for everyone who was impacted by this tragedy," she said in a statement.

On the event's Facebook page, people distributed a spreadsheet that listed identifying information -- age, height, weight, hair color, tattoos -- and contact numbers for many of those who were unaccounted for.

"Hi, I am here with the fire inspector going through the list of missing names of missing/safe," wrote one woman. "I am requesting that you only post in this thread their name and missing or safe next to it."

As San Francisco has become increasingly unaffordable, artists have regrouped across the Bay Area in places such as Oakland and Emeryville, often converting old warehouses into art spaces. The building where the fire occurred sits next to a car-stereo installation shop. Deloach-Reed said it was unclear whether the facility was used only as an artists' space or whether some people lived there as well.

Information for this article was contributed by Thomas Fuller, Eli Rosenberg, Conor Dougherty and Melissa Wen of The New York Times and by Paul Elias, Jocelyn Gecker, Jonathan J. Cooper, Olga R. Rodriguez, Evan Berland, Adam Kealoha Causey and Juliet Williams of The Associated Press.

A Section on 12/04/2016

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