Toll in Turkiye ski resort fire climbs to 76

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ISTANBUL: At least 76 people were killed Tuesday in a fire at a hotel in a popular ski resort in northern Turkey that was full of winter vacationers, including families.

The fire broke out at the Grand Cartel Hotel in Kartalkia around 3:30 a.m. (0030 GMT), sending huge plumes of smoke into the night air and panic among guests.

“Unfortunately the death toll is now 76,” Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said Tuesday night, updating the earlier figure of 66 dead.

He said that 52 victims have been identified so far and forensic experts are working to identify others. He added that the bodies of most of the victims have been returned to their families.

Survivors and witnesses spoke of desperate scenes as people tried to escape the flames by jumping out of windows or using bed sheets as makeshift ropes.

“People on the top floor were screaming. They threw sheets out of the windows, some tried to jump,” Atakan Yelkovan, who escaped from the third floor with his wife, told the IHA news agency.

A hotel employee, who did not want to be named, said he saw guests screaming for help from his windows.

“I saw a father holding his baby in his lap asking for a pillow to put his son down. Luckily he was rescued by the emergency services. were waiting for those who saved them,” he told IHA.

“But on the top floor, two women threw themselves out of the window and died,” he said, explaining that students were staying on the top floor.

Peak ski season

The tragedy occurred during peak season for the ski hotel, which is 2,000 meters above sea level and was nearly full for the two-week winter break that started on Friday.

The interior minister said that 238 guests were staying in the hotel.

Apart from the dead, 51 people were also injured.

Health Minister Kemal Mamisoglu said 17 had been discharged and 34 were still in hospital, one in intensive care.

Nine people have been arrested in connection with the fire, Yerlikaya said, updating the earlier figure of four, with investigators looking into the cause of the fire, possible negligence and who was responsible.

The owner of the hotel is also among those under investigation.

Screaming for help.

One survivor, Elim Sentric, said she and her daughter managed to get out despite thick black smoke on their landing, but her husband was trapped.

“Even though he was right behind us, he couldn’t go down because of the smoke so he jumped from the window down to the porch,” he told Anadolu news agency, adding that he then He jumped on the roof of the car for safety.

At least three people who tried to climb out of the windows fell to their deaths, NTV said.

The fire is believed to have started in the restaurant and quickly spread to the hotel, which was covered with wooden sheets. The cause was not immediately clear.

The newspaper said in a statement that the dead included a journalist who worked for the Suzko daily, who died along with his wife and two adult children.

‘great pain’

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared a national day of mourning on Wednesday, saying “our pain is great” and vowing that those responsible would be “held to account”.

Tourism Minister Nuri Ersoy said there were two survivors of the fire at the hotel and that they had inspected the fire “in 2024,” but some survivors said there appeared to be no safety measures in place.

“There was no alarm, no smoke detector and no fire escape, although there was smoke all the way up to the 10th floor,” said a sobbing man who had been in the hotel since Sunday and was quoted by several TV channels as saying. had interviewed him.

And Yalkovan, who escaped from the third floor, told IHA: “There was no fire alarm… and there was no chance to escape the fire,” adding that it took “between an hour and an hour and a half. “It seemed Firefighters to arrive.

After the flames were brought under control, footage from inside showed a blackened lobby full of charred wooden furniture and broken glass.

As Turkey counted the dead, leaders such as European Union chief Ursula van der Leyen, Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis Condolences were expressed.