'The smoke was black and acrid, I couldn't see' - nurse at care home blaze

Published on Thursday 26 November 2009 21:40

A NURSE on duty the night of a care home blaze which claimed the lives of 14 residents has described how he battled to evacuate people as fire swept through the building.

Brian Norton, 40, told a fatal accident inquiry that when the fire alarm sounded on 31 January 2004, staff at Rosepark Nursing Home in Uddingston were unsure where the fire was because a control panel indicated that the blaze was in an area where there was clearly no fire.

Earlier, Mr Norton told the inquiry he had not been told what to do if a fire alarm sounded, though he had been shown where fire exits, extinguishers and the fire alarm panel were.

However, when he and three colleagues went to investigate a corridor on the upper storey, they found smoke coming from the ceiling near a fire door which led to bedrooms.

Mr Norton shouted to two of his colleagues to phone the fire service and he and another colleague ran to stairs at the far end of the building to try to reach residents there, but were blocked by smoke.

"The smoke was black and acrid. I could not see where I was going and as I got up to the top of the stairs I knew that was where the fire was because I could hear what sounded like wood burning through the other side of the fire door," he said.

He rushed down the stairs and he and his colleague began to wake up sleeping residents and got them into the corridor ready to evacuate the building.

His voice choking with emotion, he said: "My biggest concern was that there was smoke at both stairwells and there were residents trapped between the smoke.

"My instinct was that if I didn't get people organised to get out, we could find ourselves trapped between two lots of smoke.

"We got everybody into the corridor ready to get out as I thought it would be best to prepare to go out as one body."

It was snowing so Mr Norton wrapped quilts round residents' shoulders.

Some were able to walk but others were in wheelchairs.

Mr Norton told the inquiry he was not sure if he would be able to get to the fire exit because smoke was in that area when he last looked.

All the residents from the lower storey were evacuated safely.

As well as the 14 deaths, four residents were injured in the fire.

Care home owners Thomas, Anne and Alan Balmer are represented at the inquiry, along with Strathclyde Fire Brigade, Lanarkshire Health Board and the Care Commission.

An attempt to prosecute the Balmers for alleged safety breaches collapsed in 2007 when a judge dismissed charges.