Fire kills 37 in psychiatric hospital outside Moscow
- 11 years ago
ROUGH CUT (NO REPORTER NARRATION)
STORY: A fire killed 37 people in a Russian psychiatric hospital on Friday, the second deadly blaze at such a facility this year, likely to heighten concerns about Russia's treatment of the mentally ill and other wards of the state.
There have been many deadly fires at state institutions like hospitals and schools over the past decade, raising questions about safety standards.
The pre-dawn fire razed a dilapidated ward for severely ill patients at the hospital in a provincial village north of Moscow, apparently killing some while under sedation as fog slowed firefighters travelling from 45 km (28 miles) away.
Emergency authorities had recently sought to have the run-down wood, brick and concrete building condemned as unfit for use, a senior official said. Federal authorities began a criminal inquiry into suspected lethal negligence.
State television showed firefighters spraying water on the smoking, blackened ruins of the
STORY: A fire killed 37 people in a Russian psychiatric hospital on Friday, the second deadly blaze at such a facility this year, likely to heighten concerns about Russia's treatment of the mentally ill and other wards of the state.
There have been many deadly fires at state institutions like hospitals and schools over the past decade, raising questions about safety standards.
The pre-dawn fire razed a dilapidated ward for severely ill patients at the hospital in a provincial village north of Moscow, apparently killing some while under sedation as fog slowed firefighters travelling from 45 km (28 miles) away.
Emergency authorities had recently sought to have the run-down wood, brick and concrete building condemned as unfit for use, a senior official said. Federal authorities began a criminal inquiry into suspected lethal negligence.
State television showed firefighters spraying water on the smoking, blackened ruins of the