Two people suffered serious burns and fourteen have had to be relocated not being able to return to their homes after a fire registered this Thursday in the Bilbao neighborhood of San Francisco. In addition, others two firefighters and several ertzainas who participated in the extinction work they were also injured.
The fire broke out around 8:30 a.m. on the fourth floor of number 27 from San Francisco street, a wooden structure building. Several teams from the Bilbao fire brigade went to the scene to try to put out the flames, which forced to evacuate both the portal in which they originated and the adjoining ones, 25 and 29, about thirty people in total, since the smoke had also spread in their homes. When they arrived at the place, the fire was already widespread. “The fire was fully developed on the fourth interior floor when the fire brigade arrived, affecting the entire floor, mainly the left hand side. It has been a widespread fire, broken by the façade and by the interior patio, where flames came out of the windows”, explained in the same place of the event the chief officer of Operations of the Bilbao Fire Department, Ignacio García Urkizo, in statements to Onda Vasca.
The firefighters also had to rescue two people, a 37-year-old woman and a 38-year-old man, who had been left behind. caught by the flames in one of the houses on that fourth floor. “We heard the cries for help from two people, a man and a woman, who we have rescued alive”Urkizo recounted. Both had suffered significant burns and had to be evacuated to the Major Burn Unit of the Cruces Hospital. He also had to be evacuated to the same hospital. a firefighter, with minor burns to one hand and shoulder. Likewise, another firefighter and several ertzainas were treated in the same place, without requiring transfer, for smoke inhalation.
The firefighters managed to control the fire at 9:30 a.m., although they continued working throughout the morning at the site, “ventilating the smoke in the affected block of flats and checking the structure, because it is made of wood, checking hot spots,” he explained. the chief operating officer. Of the thirty evicted residents, those who reside in portals 25 and 29 were able to return to their homes. Also all the houses on the left hand side, both interior and exterior, from the portal where the fire occurred. However, after a first assessment together with Surbisa technicians, It has been necessary to rehouse, through the Municipal Social Emergencies Service (SMUS) the residents of the entire fifth floor, as well as the right hands, both exterior and interior, from the first to the fourth. In total, fourteen people had to spend the night away from their homes.
