«We are suffering an infinite wait. We have been in anguish for several hours and this is agony. We just want them to tell us what has happened to our relatives and, from there, accept that it is what God wanted. Halfway between Isla Cristina Street, the site of the tragedy in the Las Atalayas nightclubs in Murcia, and the Palacio de Deportes, Alan Antonio Antía thus summarized yesterday the tension, restlessness and sadness that invaded the dozens of family members and friends of the possible victims as they wait for news about them.
Around eleven thirty in the morning, on the way to the nearby pavilion, whose basement was set up by the City Council to provide psychological assistance to relatives and friends, Alan was steeling himself to endure a day he would never have wanted to experience. “This is very hard,” said this man, a native of Nicaragua, while naming those with whom he celebrated his cousin Éric’s thirtieth birthday the night before in a restaurant in Puente Tocinos and who continued the party at the Fonda Milagros nightclub: «Sergio, Tania, Jon, Orfilia, Marta…».
Down the ramp of the Sports Palace, guarded by agents of the Local Police, they were descending affected by the fire. The venue was prepared by the local authorities, who by mid-morning had already counted the attendance of sixty people through psychologists and Civil Protection and Red Cross volunteers. About twenty troops made up the special device, the Councilor for Social Welfare, Family and Health, Pilar Torres, explained to LA VERDAD.
«We are making a list of family members, to be able to provide them with information about their loved ones in the most appropriate way. It is a dramatic situation, which moves all of us in Murcia and forces us to turn to people who are going through very difficult times,” Torres added. At that time, the fatalities had not yet been identified.
And he cited the involvement of the Department of Sports, headed by Miguel Ángel Noguera, to give the family members a quick response and in a nearby area but that would guarantee the families “a certain isolation.”
Between despondency and relief
The event brought a large group of journalists, including from national media, to the doors of the sports venue. They collected the testimonies of different victims, some of whom broke down with emotion in front of the cameras and took refuge in the embrace of brothers, uncles, nephews, girlfriends…
The coming and going of emergency vehicles was constant around the Palace and the leisure area, cordoned off by the agents to allow the work of the firefighters, the National Police, the forensic experts and the judicial delegation. And on an autumn Sunday, but where shade was sought because the thermometer was already approaching 30 degrees, Darwin, an Ecuadorian living in the city, spoke sadly about one of the missing women, a friend of his wife. But, at the same time, he seemed relieved for his children: “This Saturday night they stayed home.”
“The roof was on fire and there were many people there”
Alan Antonio Antía participated on Saturday night at his first Éric’s birthday dinner, at a Colombian food place in Puente Tocinos called La Fonda, just like one of the clubs in Las Atalayas de Murcia. The celebration, he explained, was also attended by Eric’s mother, Marta, and his brother, Sergio, along with his partner, Orfilia del Carmen; as well as Jordan, Alan’s cousin, and various relatives and friends, such as Tania and her husband Jon, of Ecuadorian origin, Rafael and Gloria. In total, around twenty people enjoyed the event from eight in the afternoon.
«When it was over, I went to Murcia’s house to sleep and they went to the club. At 5:30 in the morning they called my cell phone to tell me that there was a fire in the nightclub. I took my scooter and when I arrived at Las Atalayas I found that La Fonda was on fire. The roof was burning and some people who were on the ground floor managed to get out. “People were commenting that there were a lot of people inside and that it was all very distressing,” Alan said.
«Of all the people in my group, nine did not come out. They have told us that they have found six bodies and this is agony. I don’t know why they tell us that the bodies are in the Teatre nightclub, because when I arrived, Teatre was already closed,” he said mid-morning, waiting for official news.
He stated that his family has lived in Murcia for 17 years and regretted what happened: “We are good people, workers. One is a delivery man, another a bricklayer, another waiter, one cares for the elderly…
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“Smoke began to come out of the air ducts and they evicted us”
One of the survivors of the catastrophe was Walter Hernández, thirty years old. He was also at Éric’s birthday and then continued the night at the Fonda Milagros nightclub. He was on the ground floor of the establishment when he suddenly became worried: “I started to smell smoke and I saw that it was coming from the air ducts next to the bar. “We immediately saw that he was coming up there from the top floor and the employees began to tell us to vacate the nightclub,” he told this newspaper outside the Sports Palace.
«Between the workers and some of the people who were downstairs, we helped many people get out onto the streets. In the Las Atalayas area there were hundreds of people, because there were many celebrations; “That was full,” he noted.
And he indicated: «On the street I saw my cousin, Jordan, and I thought that everything was calm and normal. So, I went home, in the Progreso neighborhood, waiting for my relatives to be there, but there was no one. And since I had no means of transportation, I walked to Las Atalayas and when I arrived I found disaster,” he continued.
«The workers told us to leave. “I saw hundreds of people in the area, because there were many celebrations.”
“This is a very hard blow that life gives you,” declared a devastated Walter, who explained that he works as a gardener in the capital and whose boss came this Sunday to console him and offer him the help he needed.
“I hope I can see them again”
“I could never imagine that what started out as a birthday dinner would end like this,” he said. And she gave thanks for still being alive, although with “great sadness for those who were trapped and could not escape.”
Even without believing it, he talked about his family and the friends with whom, just hours before, he had shared a Saturday of fun that was fatally cut short. «Jon likes us to call him ‘Muerto’ and Rafael we affectionately call him Rafa. I hope he can see them again.
«Behind me, I no longer saw any of my loved ones escape»
Bewilderment and confusion. That is what still reigned hours after the tragic fire in the Las Atalayas nightclub area and which has taken the lives, for the moment, of the thirteen fatalities confirmed yesterday. Everything happened very quickly. Not even many of those gathered had had time, at the time of the disaster, to realize the magnitude of the drama. In fact, the fragile border between life and death for those who were there was drawn practically in a few minutes.
That is what happened to Arlem García, although it is difficult to talk about luck when this overwhelming event has taken the lives of a good handful of family and friends. This Nicaraguan citizen, who resides in Elche, attended the birthday celebration of her cousin Éric Hernández this Saturday night. After the dinner he attended at a restaurant in Puente Tocinos, he had gone with the rest of the participants to the Fonda Milagros nightclub, a venue with a Latin atmosphere, located in an area of warehouses that it shares with two other establishments, the Golden and the best known Theater. Six o’clock struck and Arlem left the booth – box number 18 on the first floor – in which she had danced and shared a few bottles of rum and cola with her friends, to whom she was already saying goodbye amidst a striking smell of smoke.
Cousin of the birthday boy, she had shared a booth with him and other of the deceased until minutes before the tragedy.
After going down the stairs and practically on the street, he finally realized that what was happening was serious. However, she was not able to go in to notify or check on her loved ones, whom she had been with just a few moments before. They didn’t let him go back. He couldn’t see any of them leave either. “We don’t know about anyone else,” she added.
“We don’t find them in the hospitals,” Jofre said mid-morning, trying not to make the worst of it.
“We have searched the hospitals and we can’t find them,” Jofre said distressed mid-morning and almost at the doors of the premises. “We knew each other for many years,” said this Ecuadorian citizen, dismayed and reluctant to prepare for the worst. “It seems that the roof collapsed,” he commented. This is precisely one of the few extremes that police sources had dared to confirm.
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«We are looking for my son on the networks; Fortunately, he is fine »
During the early hours of this Sunday morning, uncertainty gripped families whose children had gone out to party in the Las Atalayas area and had not returned home. This was the case of Víctor Valencia, a Murcia resident of Ecuadorian origin who went to the Sports Palace in search of information. «I have read the news about the fire in the nightclubs and I have started to get worried, because my son has not returned this morning or this morning. Just now he just wrote me a WhatsApp telling me: ‘Dad, I’m fine.’”
Relieved to know that the boy, Víctor Míchel, was not among the deceased or among the injured, this father breathed a sigh of relief before journalists.
A tremendous “scare”
«They have been difficult hours, because he usually goes to the Golden nightclub. My daughter has been looking for her brother on social media and we couldn’t find him. Fortunately, everything has been a scare,” she said. And he showed his sorrow for the victims of the fire and for his relatives and friends.
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“We have helped people escape”
“I was there; “I’m from Toledo but I’m working these days in Murcia, so I decided to go out and party,” commented this Sunday morning Víctor, who was at the time of the fire in the lower part of the Fonda Milagros nightclub, known as The Fonda.
«At first we were not aware of the severity; When smoke started to come out we went to the exit; we have even helped people escape; Later I began to feel suffocated by this smoke,” he told LA TRUTH, knowing that he has dodged a bullet. “If you analyze it you realize that I’m not telling it soon,” he concluded.
A few meters from the leisure area, and while the Emergency teams and the National Police worked in the burned buildings, Inés cried without apparent consolation. Together with her nephew, Alan, the woman remembered her sister-in-law Marta and her children, Éric and Sergio, who had not been able to leave the nightclub on the fateful morning.
«We are very affected. We hope they give us information soon,” she commented sadly, as the minutes seemed like hours.
At his side, friends of other fire victims watched as the firefighters worked to rescue the bodies, in the entertainment venues on Isla Cristina Street.
In addition to stories from survivors about what happened at the La Fonda nightclub, during the birthday of the young Nicaraguan Éric, there were testimonies about how the fire in Teatre was experienced.
A crucial decision
María José told Onda Regional that she was invited to another birthday party at this last establishment in Las Atalayas and that, after half past five, she convinced a friend to move to the ground floor. That, she claimed, was crucial for both of them to save their lives.
He said that they left the box, located on the upper floor of the nightclub, because they wanted to see DJ Toni Bafles perform, and that they saw flashes on the side of the nightclub. Likewise, he stated that he observed something similar to a flare and added that the security team of this leisure establishment was mobilized to carry out the evacuation. They were moments of tension and fear.
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