As of: March 25, 2024, 11:10 a.m
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A firefighter climbs a ladder at a house where there has been a fire.
© David Young/dpa
Dramatic major fire in an old building in Solingen: Three people die in the flames and nine are seriously injured.
A toddler is missing.
Solingen - Three people, including a child, were killed in a dramatic major fire in an old building in Solingen on Monday morning.
A small child was still missing in the morning.
The firefighters searched for him primarily in the attic of the house.
“The chance of survival is dwindling from minute to minute,” said fire department operations manager Gottfried Kreuzberg.
Nine people were taken to hospitals with serious injuries.
According to the fire department, twelve other people suffered minor injuries, nine of whom were taken to hospitals.
The fire probably broke out on the first floor of the approximately 100-year-old house with wooden ceilings and a wooden staircase and spread rapidly, said a fire department spokesman.
In the morning, around 120 emergency services had the fire under control, but extinguishing work was still ongoing.
The cause of fire was unclear for the moment.
To escape the flames, a man with a child in his arms and a woman jumped out of the building's windows, the spokesman reported.
One person landed on a car roof even though the fire department had set up a jumping cushion.
Emergency pastors are on duty.
The city had assigned a bus to quickly accommodate uninjured residents, he said.
The advancing firefighters discovered the dead in the attic of the four-story house, the spokesman said.
The house was massively destroyed in the fire and the stairwell partially collapsed.
The fire was reported to the fire department at 2:46 a.m., the spokesman said.
When the fire brigade arrived, the wooden stairwell was “red-hot and fully ablaze,” said the operations manager.
The escape route was “completely burned away”.
dpa