96 Dead in Fire Ignited at Rhode Island Club

Sparks from Great White's pyrotechnics display appeared to ignite soundproofing. (WPRI-TV, via Associated Press)

PAM BELLUCK and PAUL von ZIELBAUER (New York Times) write, "WEST WARWICK, R.I., Feb. 21 — A raging fire ignited by a rock band's pyrotechnics display ripped through a nightclub here late Thursday night, leaving at least 96 people dead and 187 injured."

The inferno at a club called the Station was the deadliest nightclub fire in the United States in 25 years and one of the worst in the country's history, with the death toll exceeding that of the 1990 Happy Land social club fire in the Bronx, which killed 87.

Survivors described a ghastly scene that began when the heavy metal band Great White lighted pyrotechnic cones on stage minutes after its concert began around 11 p.m. and a shower of white sparks appeared to ignite foam sound-proofing material that lined walls near the stage. The authorities said the fire spread almost instantly to paneling and a low-hanging suspended ceiling.

Numerous witnesses said the building was almost instantly engulfed in flames and patrons bolted for doorways and smashed windows. People raced and clambered outside with their hair and flesh on fire.

"People were bleeding, their hair was being burned off, their skin was just melting off, skin was just dangling," said Christopher Travis, 33, a construction worker from Lakeville, Mass., who was in the club. "You could smell flesh burning even when I was inside."

West Warwick's fire chief, Charles Hall, said the club had been inspected two months ago. But he said that neither the club nor the band appeared to have obtained the necessary town or state fire permits for a pyrotechnics display. The band's lead singer said the club had been informed that such a display was planned, but the club's owners and employees insisted they were never told about the sparklers.

Gov. Donald L. Carcieri said officials, including the state attorney general, local police and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, were investigating to see whether anyone should be held responsible for the fire.

Mr. Carcieri, who cut short a working vacation in Florida to return to Rhode Island today, said it appeared that about 350 people were in the club, which had a capacity of 300.

Investigators said most of the victims had either been burned to death or died of smoke inhalation, though some may have been trampled in the rush to escape. Some bodies were so charred that officials were having trouble making identification and planned to use DNA samples and other methods. Names of the victims were not being released this evening because many family members had not been notified, officials said.

The fire came just four days after 21 people were killed in a stampede at a Chicago nightclub after security guards used pepper spray to break up a fight.

It was clear that the fire had dealt a horrific blow to Rhode Island, a state that often sees itself as one close-knit community. Countless state residents had some connection to people who had been in the club in this former textile mill town of 30,000 about 15 miles southwest of Providence.

"People say, In the world it's six degrees of separation," said the attorney general, Patrick Lynch. "In Rhode Island, it's probably a degree and a half."

All day, as the death toll climbed and rescuers used cranes to lift the blackened debris and look for bodies, friends and relatives showed up at the ravaged hulk that was the Station looking for people they knew or thought had been at the show.

George Guindon, 35, a house painter who was at the club on Thursday night and was burned on his head, hand and leg, returned to the Station this afternoon searching for a close friend, Matt Darby, a man whose wife is nine months pregnant, who he feared had not survived.

"I'm hoping he got out and has amnesia or something and is just walking around somewhere," Mr. Guindon said.

Mr. Guindon described his escape: "The flames were over my head, coming through the bar. I figure I had two choices: make a run for it or stay and die. I jumped over the bar and ran toward the wall, hoping I'd hit a window and not the wall.

"I ran across the street and into the snow. I looked back and saw people coming out. One guy, he already looked dead. He said, `Don't touch me.' He had no face."

Donna Miele, 40, showed up to look for her brother and his wife, Michael and Sandy Hoogasian. Ms. Miele said that her brother, a longtime Great White fan, had not been able to get tickets to the show. But on Thursday afternoon, he happened to be in a tattoo parlor getting a tattoo of a flame when he noticed the band's lead singer getting a tattoo as well.

Mr. Hoogasian, 31, was thrilled when he was invited to see the performance as the band's guest, Ms. Miele said. Now, with a tear-stained face, Ms. Miele described how she had called all the hospitals and could not find her brother and sister-in-law on any of the lists.

"This is so much pain," she said, "more pain than I've ever known."

At the hospitals, 81 people had been admitted by this afternoon and 25 were in critical condition, the authorities said.

Liz Arruda, 23, a waitress from New Bedford, Mass., suffered second-degree burns over 30 percent of her body, mostly on her back, which was struck by a piece of burning roof. The rubber soles of her sneakers melted into the floor and she escaped after a friend picked her up and threw her over a crowd of people and out the club's back door.

Ms. Arruda's mother, Dorothy Burt, visited her this afternoon in the burn unit at Rhode Island Hospital. The hospital ward, filled with nearly 40 fire victims, was "like a battle zone," Ms. Burt said. "You see people literally without faces."

Doctors gave some of the more critical patients a 40 percent to 50 percent chance of survival.

Among those missing was a guitarist for Great White, Ty Longley.

There were conflicting reports about whether the club was told that Great White was planning to ignite pyrotechnics.

The band's lead singer, Jack Russell, said in an interview today in the Crowne Plaza hotel, where families of the victims have been gathering, that the band had notified the club about its plans. "We had permission," Mr. Russell said. "We never have not had permission."

But the club's owners, Michael and Jeffrey Derderian, issued a statement today through their lawyer, Kathleen M. Hagerty, saying: "At no time did either owner have prior knowledge that pyrotechnics were going to be used by the band Great White. No permission was ever requested by the band or its agents to use pyrotechnics at the Station, and no permission was ever given."

Also today, several nightclubs where Great White had performed recently, said they had not been given notice that the band planned to use pyrotechnics.

Domenic Santana, the owner of the Stone Pony in Asbury Park, N.J., said no one at the club was told about the pyrotechnic equipment for a show on Feb. 14. Mr. Santana said other details were stipulated in the contract, "from towels to the number of yellow M&M's they want."

He said that when the sparks began to fly, "our stage manager reacted right away and went onstage and told their tour manager: " `What are you doing You can't be doing this.' " Security workers smothered the devices, he said.

A lawyer for Russell's nightclub in Bangor, Me., said Great White did not tell club management that it planned to use the sparklers in a show on Tuesday night.

But at other clubs like Shark City in Glendale Heights, Ill., and at Don Hill's in New York, where Great White was scheduled to play this week until the show was canceled because of snow, managers said the band had asked for permission for pyrotechnics but was turned down.

The Station, which has gone through several incarnations over at least five decades as a hangout for World War II sailors on leave, an Italian restaurant in the 1970's, and a nightclub since the early 1990's had been inspected just two months ago as part of its liquor-license renewal process, Chief Hall said. He said that some violations were found in the inspection, but that they had been corrected. The club was not large enough to require a sprinkler system, the chief said.

The Derderians have owned the club since March 2000. Jeffrey Derderian is a television reporter recently hired by WPRI in Providence. On Thursday night, he and a cameraman were apparently preparing a report on nightclub safety in light of the Chicago club stampede.

The fire generated reaction in at least one other state today when Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts announced that he would form a task force to help fire officials inspect every nightclub in the state.

Mario Giamei, 38, a former bouncer for the Station for years who was there Thursday night as a patron, said "this particular management was the best equipped to put a lot of resources in the club."

Mr. Giamei returned to the club this afternoon hoping to hear word of four employees and the wife of a fifth who had been at work on Thursday.

Great White was popular on the heavy metal circuit in the 1980's. It was nominated for a Grammy Award for best hard rock performance in 1990 for its song "Once Bitten, Twice Shy."

Fans at Thursday night's performance, which came in a week when many students were on vacation, ranged from 16 to their 40's, doctors who treated some survivors said. The show was heavily promoted, especially by a disc jockey called Dr. Metal, who was apparently at the club on Thursday night.

Several patrons said they were not surprised to see the sparklers and did not immediately realize that the fire was out of control.

"Sometimes you see it happen where the wall will catch on fire, but then it will go out," said Brandon Fravala, 24, a truck driver from Westerly, R.I.

In an interview with WHDH television in Boston, Mr. Russell said that when the fire started, he was "standing in the sparklers like I always do."

"It's not a hot flame," he said. "The next thing I felt this heat, so I turned around and I see that some of the foam's on fire."

Mr. Russell said he poured a glass of water on the fire, but it was too late. "Then I was waiting for someone with a fire extinguisher to show up, and nobody showed up. So I started hustling people out the door."

The owners' statement said Jeffrey Derderian also helped some of the patrons out of the building.

Fire officials said that, although there were four doors in the club, many of the patrons tried to rush out the front door. But Chief Hall said the majority of bodies were found clustered in restrooms and other corners and pockets, suggesting that people might have tried to break out of windows in those out-of-the-way areas.

Governor Carcieri said rescue crews got out as many as 100 people.

Today, as each body was unearthed, rescue workers paused and removed their hats, as fire department chaplains led them in prayer.

"They are going through a nightmare," Governor Carcieri said of the rescuers. "This is a very agonizing, emotional, draining effort."

Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

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