Eight apartments were badly damaged in the fire that broke out in Opwijk on Friday afternoon. We learned this Saturday morning that a nonagenarian died after being transported to a hospital.
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This Friday, the medical emergency plan was in effect in Opwijk.
The fire broke out at around 2:40 p.m. on the roof of one of the apartments, presumably due to roofing work, and quickly spread. When the firefighters arrived, the flames were already spreading from the roofs of the various apartments. The entire building, which contains around 30 apartments, was evacuated, along with an adjacent building.
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Residents of the affected apartments were housed first in a community center and then in a nearby school.
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At around 5 p.m., the firefighters had the fire under control, but they still had to put it out. The damage to the apartments concerned is in any case considerable. The roof is largely destroyed and it is planned to carry out a controlled collapse of part of the facades. The ground floor and the first floors would not have been affected by the fire, but there would have been water damage.
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If yesterday we did not deplore any victim, a 92-year-old lady died in hospital, we learned this Saturday morning from our Flemish colleagues. The victim was “very panicked after the fire”, explains the mayor Inez De Coninck.
She was diagnosed with a brain hemorrhage in her nineties: “I suspect it was from the stress and panic. The family will be able to say goodbye to him, but it remains dramatic ”.
In all, around 100 people were affected by the fire. A psychosocial team was set up by the local authorities to come to their aid in the aftermath of the disaster.
