Celebration Turned to Tragedy

"One door was blocked, so we opened it by force [in an outsider rescue attempt]. Massive flames came out of the hall. It was like Hell's doors opened."

"The temperature was unbearable. I cannot describe the extreme heat."

"I could not do anything but run away from the fire."

"After the firefighters arrived, I rushed inside to look for my friends. I saw 26 dead bodies in the bathroom. A 12-year-old girl was completely burnt and left in a corner."

"I cannot describe what I feel. I know families that lost almost everyone. At least three families have lost every single member in the fire."

"The whole community is sad, not only in Nineveh province, but all over Iraq. The whole country is sad." 

Nineteen-year-old Ghaly Nassim    

 

"What I saw was very difficult."   

"I have seen people with more than 90% of their bodies completely burnt [at least 50 children were pronounced dead as soon as they arrived at the hospital]."

Chief Nurse Israa Mohammed, Mosul's specialized medical centre for burns 

 

"We miraculously left the place. The groom and the bride were among the people who survived the accident. I was just with them, and their psychological condition was very difficult."

"I took some wounded to the hospital. What I saw in the hospital is difficult to describe. Many of the victims were burned and dead."

Wedding family member 

Chandelier catches alight in fire that killed more than 100 people at wedding in Iraq – still from video

What could represent a more festive social occasion than a wedding? At this one, in the mostly Christian-occupied Hamdaniya area of Nineveh province, in Iraq, not far from Mosul the entertainment aftermath was a critical disaster. There were 250 guests. All invited to celebrate a wedding, the start of a new life together for a couple looking into the future. All too soon, as the celebratory dancing was initiated by the new bride and groom the 250 attendees panicked; guests in the Haitham Royal Wedding Hall stampeded toward the exits as flaming decorations and pieces of ceiling rained down on them.

Some cultures have strange and dangerous ideas about how they express jubilation, the joy of an event. As for example, shooting firearms into the air as an expression of excited happiness and power. What goes up will come down, and bullets can be lethal in their original forceful trajectory as well as their re-entry from a targetless shooting. And then there is the addiction to brilliant lights and explosive sounds inherent in fireworks displays, capturing attention, enrapturing the eyes, exciting the pulse.

 

Kurdish television news channel Rudaw showed footage of the event, of pyrotechnics blasting flames from the event's floor, hitting a chandelier and setting it afire. Authorities blamed flammable building materials that contributed to the blaze. An eruption of hellfire that killed 100 people and injured 150 more, accounting in total for the number of invited guests. 

 

Witnesses explained what they recall of the shocking events. Faten Youssef described the bride and groom initiating a ritualistic slow dance, when the fire began and raced through the plastic decorations that festooned the hall. And soon the ceiling began collapsing, the 50-year-old woman said. "Flames started falling on us. things were falling down and blocked the way to the exit".

 

Her family found a way through a kitchen exit, struggling through smoke and flames. A bystander shot video that showed a desperate attempt by people outside the hall to aid the escape of those trapped within. One man attempted to knock down a wall with an excavator. Soon, local hospitals were receiving victims conveyed by screeching fleets of ambulances. 

 

Bandaged survivors received oxygen. Workers at the hospital organized more oxygen cylinders, but then it was realized there was a shortage of oxygen; too many calls too suddenly exhausted hospital supplies, including burn bandages. Children were among those being treated for severe burns. Paramedics worked for hours after the fire was extinguished bringing out the injured.

It is customary in many countries in the Middle East for extravagant wedding ceremonies and entertainment planned for the hundreds of relatives and community members representing the wedding parties' close acquaintances and family members. Spectacularly elaborate decorations in the halls, with music and entertainers, and quite often pyrotechnics for the amusement and entertainment of all concerned.

 

Highly flammable material is thought to have fuelled the blaze