Mexico nursery blaze kills many children

The Mexican nursery gutted by a fire that killed 38 babies and toddlers, was a badly converted warehouse with and an emergency exit that would not open, it is claimed. There were 142 children aged from six months to five years in the ABC Center in the desert city of Hermosillo, near the US border, when the fire tore through the nursery. Thirty-three children are still in hospital of which 15 are in a critical condition. One of the children is brain dead.

Live footage on Mexican television showed chaotic scenes as distraught parents arrived and desperately looked for their children. Firefighters carried injured children through the front door — the building's only working exit — and through large holes that a parent knocked into the walls before rescue crews arrived, said a fire service official. As doctors warned the death toll was likely to rise, the grandmother of an injured two-year-old told reporters the centre was in a "bad condition."

Guadalupe Arvizu, whose daughter is a caretaker at the state-run nursery said the building's emergency exit could not be opened on the day of the fire. "The place is in bad condition. It's a warehouse," she in The Times newspaper. "There are no windows in the classrooms," she added. It has been suggested that the fire started in a neighbouring tyre depot. But, warehouse manager Victor Hugo Ayala said that it had started in a car parked on the street outside. "We heard a bang as the car exploded and ran out to help," Ayala said. "This is a terrible tragedy but the fire did not start in the tyre shop." Jose Larrinaga, a spokesman for the area’s state prosecutor's office, said it was too early to rule on what sparked the inferno."We're still investigating what caused the fire," Mr Larrinaga said.

Noe Velasquez, worker at a nearby auto parts depot helped free five toddlers. He said the father of one of the children rammed his pickup truck through a wall in a desperate attempt to get to the children. Daniel Karam, the director of Mexico's Social Security Institute, which outsourced services to the privately run day care centre said a recent inspection found the building, a converted warehouse, complied with safety standards.

Fire safety is often poor in Mexico. Many buildings lack basic precautions such as smoke alarms and fire extinguishers even though blazes are common in northern Mexico where summer temperatures can top 50 degrees centigrade (122 Fahrenheit) the Guardian newspaper reported.

By Hayley Jarvis for SOS Children