Tenant: Ex-tenant calls warehouse ‘death trap’

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He says excavators, a crane and dumpster trucks are being brought in to help in the recovery and the building is being flooded with light to allow crews to work through the night. “It was quiet. It was heart-breaking” Drayton said. Nine bodies have been recovered but officials fear as many as 40 could be dead. Ray Kelly called the number of deaths “astronomical” and believes this could be the deadliest fire in the city’s history (a 1991 fire killed 25 people).

“What we were able to accomplish in 12 hours was a phenomenal feat”, Drayton said. In 2003, The Station nightclub in Rhode Island was similarly stricken, resulting in 100 deaths.

“I don’t know where the fire started, but I do know that the way the building was situated made it hard for people to escape”, Reed said.

Investigators said they had searched through about one third of the building.

A former tenant of the warehouse where a deadly fire erupted at a dance party describes it as a “death trap” with illegal electrical cords and music equipment. But several former residents there said Ion also let people live in the warehouse, while ignoring warnings from the city about fire hazards. One staircase led to a boarded up door. “Half the time they didn’t even have running water, let alone heated water”. She said none were ever made.

Officials in Oakland say the 33 people confirmed dead in a fire at a warehouse range in age from teenagers to 30-plus years old.

The warehouse where Almena and his family live was rented out the night of the fire.

A second-story of building was hosting a dance party where many died when the only escape route – a makeshift stairway made of pallets – was destroyed by fire.

Fernando Valenzuela, who graduated from a nearby high school and now has an insurance business in the neighborhood, said the building always scared him.

Melley reported from San Francisco. Phone numbers either rang continually or were disconnected.

The rave party was held in a cluttered, maze-like warehouse for artists, fire officials said Saturday. An inspector who went to the premises couldn’t get inside, said Darin Ranelletti, of the Oakland Planning Department.

Online records listed the building’s owner as Nar Siu Chor.

Shelley Mack said she was not told the residence was illegal until after she moved in a couple of years ago, and she stayed for four to five months.

“It’s like a horror house”.

Bourdeaux says she left the collective after a falling out with Ion over his kids.

Orange flames shot through the roof as the fire burned for hours and thick smoke billowed into the sky. There’s no infrastructure for electronic music to have these safe spaces. City officials said there were no sprinklers in the building.

Ranelletti said the city was aware of reports that people were living there, but no permits had been issued for that goal. “It was random pieces of wood put together to create something that you could get up to the top floor on”.

Reports of the 3-alarm fire started around 11:30 p.m. Friday night at the warehouse, where a party was taking place.