A young British couple may be forced to cancel their wedding after losing the bride’s wedding dress in a fire. Lukasz Kurek and Agnieszka Uliasz, from Dagenham in East London, paid around $3,000 for the dress, which was destroyed in a fire that enveloped an apartment block and which the British press described as an “inferno.” More than 220 firefighters tackled the blaze, and 80 people were evacuated when flames encased the building just before 3 a.m. on August 27.
Residents of the apartment block on Freshwater Road in London’s famous East End were given emergency housing at a local community center, and remarkably, only two sustained minor injuries. The London Fire Brigade (LFB) said the building had a “number of safety issues” but did not expand except to confirm that a thorough investigation would be carried out.
Mr. Kurek made similar remarks to reporters, saying there were “a lot of concerns.” He added that neither he nor his fiancee heard any fire alarms and that the fire escape immediately below their apartment was locked shut.
LFB commissioner Andy Roe said the investigation is his priority but would likely move slowly. Meanwhile, on August 19, a construction contractor posted an image of the building on Facebook with a note confirming that its staff were engaged in removing “non-compliant cladding” from the external structure. LFB has not commented on the post.
The enormous fire is reminiscent of the Grenfell tragedy of 2017, in which more than 70 people died. A fire at Grenfell Tower in West London burned for more than 60 hours while TV cameras broadcast the terrifying images across the UK. Seventy people died at the scene, and a further two died later in hospital.
A 2019 report concluded that the blaze started in the kitchen of an apartment on the 16th floor of the 24-storey building. Experts said a defective refrigerator was the ultimate culprit, but the fire spread due to burning embers floating out of the kitchen window and landing elsewhere in the block. Dr. Niamh Nic Daéid, who led the investigation, said she believed an unidentifiable substance in the kitchen significantly fueled the flames in the short five-minute period it took for firefighters to arrive.
