Antoinette was harassed by the man she had lived with for 24 years, and the court ordered him to leave home. In a rage, Vesselin scratched the stick on pre-purchased cans of gasoline
“Whoever succeeded – ran away, no one wants to remember and talk about what happened,” said a man and entered his apartment. More than two years after the explosion in entrance 4 of block 302 in Varna’s Vladislav Varnenchik district, many of its residents have already sold their properties for as much money as they could.
They moved away in an attempt to forget the horrible smell of smoke.
At 4.17 am on January 13, 2020, the fourth floor was shaken by a very powerful explosion. Seconds later, Apartment 24 is engulfed in flames that quickly creep to neighboring homes.
Dreamy people panickedly seek refuge from the raging fire and suffocating smoke
Many will later tell with gratitude how they were evacuated from the ladder by the 6 firefighters who arrived in a flash.
Three of the block lost their lives in the tragic incident – Veselin Dimitrov, 53, Mariana, whose culprit was found in a neighboring apartment. And on February 16, 85-year-old grandmother Ivana Prodanova died, who suffered complications and died after many days in a coma. 18 people were gassed, including 4 children, all of whom were treated in two hospitals.
Antoaneta Dimova, who owns the blown up apartment, was a victim of domestic violence. For years, she has been harassed by the man she lived with – former police officer Veselin Dimitrov, who caused the blast. Later, Antoinette recovered from the incident and from the psychological trauma with the help of the SOS Families at Risk Foundation, which placed her in a sheltered housing for months.
After the serious incident, he returned to the block only once – there was a meeting at the entrance to decide how to distribute the money raised from aid. However, the neighbors do not welcome her with open arms – they say that she is to blame for the incident that changed their lives, and they leave her without a share of the financial aid.
“Together we refused – she is not entitled to compensation because she is to blame
about what happened. I can’t tell you the details, “said an angry man living in an apartment on her floor. A few months after this meeting, Antoinette sold her already renovated apartment and no one saw her again.
The neighbor, who does not want to remember the experience, added that four more from the entrance died, most of them living near the exploded apartment. They died of stress and fear.
Vesselin and Antoinette have been living as a family for 24 years in her apartment, the first slap coming from the beginning of their relationship. Over time, they turned into beatings – with fists to the head and chest.
“He threatened to kill me, behead me, set me on fire for what he did,” the woman told Nova TV after the blast. Her son from a previous marriage is also harassed by the abuser.
Former police officer Veselin Dimitrov is suspected of the irreparable incident. According to a court decision of January 6, 2020, he had to leave the apartment due to domestic harassment of Antoinette.
On Christmas Eve, a month and a half before the explosion, the woman left their home and was placed in a shelter.
At the first inspection of the site of the tragedy it became clear that the explosion was not from a gas cylinder or boiler. However, it takes time to determine the composition of the explosive.
Initially, the police announced the search for 66-year-old Veselin Dimitrov, who was spotted taking luggage out of the apartment the night before.
Neighbors told investigators that they heard the former police officer in a telephone conversation on the balcony threatening to take revenge for his wife leaving him on the street.
Vesselin worked as a soldier and as a policeman, but in 1995 he was disciplined by the Ministry of Interior for corruption, according to the Varna District Prosecutor’s Office. She instituted pre-trial arson proceedings in the case, with two dead and significant material damage.
Instead of leaving, the man stocked up on 30 liters of gasoline and 11 liters of propane-butane, put them in the apartment and arranged the furniture so that the shock wave was as strong as possible.
Two badly burned bodies were found in the wreckage after the explosion. It turned out that one belonged to Veselin and the other to a woman from a neighboring apartment.
Thanks to the donation campaign, more than BGN 25,000 are collected, 15,000 of which are donations from the Varna and Veliko Preslav dioceses. At a condominium meeting, the victims are divided into 3 categories: the most affected 6 apartments receive BGN 2,500 each, the average affected 10 apartments receive BGN 800 each, and the few affected apartments, which are 3 apartments, receive BGN 135 each.
This money has hardly been enough for more serious repairs, the most affected have added a lot of money from themselves, fixed their apartments and left. The heirs of the deceased elderly woman also sold the home a long time ago.
The entrance no longer smells of smoke,
as it was days after the accident, the walls were painted and the doors replaced. At first glance, nothing reminds of the unfortunate January 13. However, the new plaster cannot erase the nightmare and the residents do not want to talk about this day – they want to forget it for an hour, which is not easy.
“It was like an action movie being shown on TV. But now it was happening before our eyes – the smell of burns, the horror and screams of people will not be forgotten soon, “said succinctly Iva, who lives on one of the high floors. Denitsa Ivanova, whose apartment is above the one that was blown up, went to the apartment days after the incident, but the young son could not calm down in the new place.
At the beginning, every day before entering, he asks her to check if there is a fire in their house. A little later, she also sold the apartment in which they miraculously survived.
Many of the entrances have managed to use the services of a professional psychologist. Those who do not have the strength to move and deal with real estate transactions remain in block 302.
In it remain the memories that everyone deals with on their own.
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