This is the horrifying moment firefighters first saw the Grenfell Tower fire.

[Cattledog]

Link to tweet

[RhodeIslandOne]

1. "There's kids in there"

Really gives you an insight to the bravery and guts of these guys and what they do every day.

[Hortensis]

2. "How is that even possible?" Absolutely.

[malaise]

3. Only when you don't use fire resistant material

in the name of cheaper

[elehhhhna]

4. Polystyrene cladding

Wth?

[malaise]

6. Gentrification in form

Fugg the poor and minorities - as long as it looks OK for 'their' skyline. State terrorism - there it is!

[pangaia]

9. Well said, malaise...well said.

That's the damn truth...

Urban renewal.

[Hortensis]

5. Right. This shouldn't be possible was almost my first thought.

It looked unbelievable, like a silly action movie's version of a high-rise fire.

[malaise]

8. You're right

This was man, woman and childslaughter. Imagine their comments if this had happened in a developing country.

[Hortensis]

10. 79 dead last count. New info is that the flammable cladding was

still legal in UK even though banned in many other nations, including the U.S., and was actually new, added in a recent renovation.

"The material in the exterior cladding consisted of insulation sandwiched between two sheets of aluminum. The type used at Grenfell Tower is made under the Reynobond name by Arconic, a company spun off from the aluminum giant Alcoa last year. It was installed around the tower, which was built in 1974, in a renovation completed last year.

Critics of the material have warned for years that aluminum surface sheets can melt in a fire, after which flames could race through flammable insulation. If other protections fail and fire penetrates the cladding, “It is like you have got a high-rise building and you are encasing it in kerosene,” said Edwin Galea, director of the Fire Safety Engineering Group at the University of Greenwich. “It is insanity, pure and simple.”

Such a runaway blaze appears to have been precisely what happened at Grenfell Tower. The flames engulfed the building in a matter of minutes, moving from the outside inward and emitting a dark smoke characteristic of burning insulation."

[lostnfound]

13. Reminds me of a birthday candle lit from the bottom, or a wooden match.

Disregard for the residents but also for the firefighters.

Hard to believe this is still happening in 2017. Capitalism needs human supervision. Or to be kept restrained like an animal in a cage at the zoo. "Individual informed consumers" are not the solution to every last problem. Whoever knew about this, and profited by it, ought to be stripped of a good part of their wealth and have to volunteer in a burn ward.

[malaise]

15. That is precisely what happened here

Murder most foul

[BumRushDaShow]

7. From the video - "It's a towering inferno here"

I remember seeing that movie in the theater (plus read both books that it was based on - "The Tower" and "The Glass Inferno&quot .





It underscored all the "cost saving" decisions that were made in the construction that eventually precipitated the fire and ultimately created a death trap.

[MrScorpio]

11. "How is that even possible?"

Tories, my friend.

Tories.

[Historic NY]

12. London Fire Brigade only has a 110 ft Ladder truck.....

the building was over 259 ft. Inadequate standpipes, sprinklers, fire proof materials. They were undercut the day the building was built.

[leftyladyfrommo]

14. That is the worst fire since 9/11 that I have ever seen.

Stuff of nightmares.