'A roof over your head is better than no roof, except when it burns down and kills you'

Tuesday, 16 May 2023

Tamrat Issé Adan speaks about his experience escaping Loafers Lodge from a devastating fire.

Nigussie Fenja approached the police cordon surrounding the burnt out Loafers Lodge around 10am.

He just wanted to see the list – the list of names of the people who’d made it out from that morning’s fire, and those who hadn’t.

A leader in Wellington’s Ethiopian community, he stood at the taped-off intersection, with a bright green shirt, gold watch, and a look of desperation and deepest concern.

All he knew was that four members of his community had been staying in the hostel when it caught fire.

* Six confirmed dead so far after Wellington fire, part of hostel still to be searched

* Live: Many feared dead in Wellington Loafers Lodge hostel fire

A fire at Wellington’s Loafers Lodge left at least six dead.

Since news of the blaze broke, he’d heard nothing.

So here he was, hands clasped, asking for help, wanting to know the fate of his friends.

“I need to find out if they have been moved, or not survived.”

Sandwiched between the bright orange of Beaurepaires and VTNZ, and the teal of Zip Plumbing on Wellington’s Adelaide Rd, Loafers Lodge was a four-storey brutalist block of beige. Except now its front was scarred black from the night’s inferno, which engulfed the top floor and licked out the seven windows along the street front.

A sign hanging from its entrance promised “Superior Rooms”, but nobody spoken to in the wake of the fire had felt indulged there.

In truth, most were there because they had no other option, or had been sent there by bureaucrats.

When the fire erupted shortly after midnight, they’d fled, streaming out of the entrance, into the night and a street painted orange as the flames took hold and popping noises punctuated the dark.

It was a game of fire whack-a-mole – every time the fire crews snuffed out a spot, another would flare up.

At its peak, more than 80 firefighters from 29 crews slogged to tame the blaze.

By morning the damage looked deceptively minor - a sooty smudge across the building’s top left corner. But the fire claimed at least six lives. More were missing.

The previous hours’ events were just starting to sink in.

Wellington mayor Tory Whanau stood on a street corner looking stunned, not knowing quite what to do, but knowing this was the right place to be, right now.

Most of the commuter traffic had been re-routed, but students still weaved past on pink scooters, and dogs were led on morning walks.

Passersby took photos as they crossed the street nearby. Pyro porn.

A woman emerged from the nearby Countdown and stared at the building for a long time, as if struggling to match the mundanity of the broccoli and bananas she clutched, with the obvious horrors she was looking at.

Murray had just come out of Wellington’s hospital after visiting his wife who’d had open-heart surgery the day before. He saw the cameras and crowds, and thought someone was filming a movie.

First floor resident Simon Hanify knocked on doors to clear his floor, before fleeing barefoot with only his headphones, wallet and phone.

The reality shocked him.

“Are they still pulling people out?”

He’d heard the sirens during the night, but thought nothing of it - his motel was across from the hospital so of course there were sirens.

The motel had double-booked him for the next night, so he’d been looking for somewhere else to stay, while he cared for his wife.

“Bloody lucky I didn’t check into that place.”

Shocked evacuees were moved 1500 metres up the road to Newtown Park, usually home to running races and dog walkers.

One man sat on the ground in front of the clubroom doors shrouded like a mummy in a white blanket, bare feet against the concrete. Like many who’d leapt from their beds, he had no time to pull on shoes or extra clothes.

But help was quick to arrive. First floor resident Simon Hanify’s bare feet trotted alongside a support worker from charity DCM, as she unloaded a box of shoes.

Injured fire evacuee Tala Sili enters the emergency centre at Newtown Park following the Loafer's Lodge fire on Tuesday morning

Hanify, 53, had been at the hostel about five months – long enough to have experienced endless fire false alarms. Often, residents didn’t bother leaving their rooms. It was sure to be more burnt toast.

There’d been an earlier false alarm about 10.30 or 11pm before the trilling began again at about 12.20. Hanify was awake, watching YouTube on his phone. He only left his room to have a cigarette. Smelling smoke he looked for a fire in the kitchen, but found none. Then he saw it coming through the fire door.

He knocked on doors to get his neighbours to safety.

And now here he was, with no shoes and an uncertain future.

Hanify was lucky – at least he got out with his wallet and phone. Many didn’t even have that, he said.

Even after daybreak, smoke continued to rise off the roof of the soot-blackened hostel.

“We don’t know where we are going…The guys on the top floor have lost every f…ing thing they own.”

Despite the trauma, he evacuated with his humour intact. He claims the place was infested with bed bugs. At least they’ll have been heat-treated, he joked.

But later in the day, the reality of the tragedy started to weigh heavy.

They’d been told they couldn’t get back inside for at least a few days. And there was no knowing whether anything was recoverable.

He’d been grateful to live there – it had saved him from homelessness after a few weeks living under a tree.

But he was upset to learn that some he passed in the hallways had died.

Umer Dalu, who escaped the Loafers Lodge fire in Wellington.

“A roof over your head is better than no roof, except when it burns down and kills you.”

Back at the lodge, as Prime Minister Chris Hipkins toured the site and met police and fire crews, fresh white plumes rose from the building. A firefighter on a cherry picker saturated the roof.

Wear a mask, someone urged – the smoke might be contaminated. Officials in white hazmat suits walked the streets of Newtown picking up debris and stashing it in bags labelled “asbestos”.

Pepe Robertson came from the neighbouring suburb of Berhampore with a bouquet of flowers cut fresh from her garden. Unable to pass the cordon, she placed them on a street corner. She didn’t know anyone who lived there, but her voice still quivered with emotion.

“It’s just so sad.”

As the sun broke through mid-morning, Umer Dalu walked down John St, stood with his back to Countdown’s wall, and looked across at where he lived – and what he’d escaped from.

After visiting his family in Ethiopia last year, the 35-year-old had struggled to find accommodation, despite approaching authorities.

So for the last five months, he’d lived at Loafers Lodge, somewhere to crash after long shifts driving Ubers.

He was well asleep when the fire started.

The first he knew about it was smelling smoke as it curled under the door of his second-floor room.

“The smoke was everywhere, I go out.”

He only had time to grab his phone and car keys.

“And when I come out, the other people is running out.”

He stood in the sun and watched firefighters filter in and out of the scene.

He didn’t know where he would stay that night – hopefully with friends.

That was about all he had left.

“I only got this one,” he said, motioning to his Nike hoodie and sweatpants. “Nothing else here.”