Bradford City initially prospered in the Second Division only missing out on promotion to the First Division in 1988 after failing to beat Ipswich Town at home on the final day of their first full season back at Valley Parade. But the sheer density of numbers coupled with the thick, choking smoke made people collapse. Part of the Appeal funds were raised by a recording of "You'll Never Walk Alone"[42] from Rodgers and Hammerstein's musical Carousel by The Crowd (including Gerry Marsden of Gerry and the Pacemakers, who had recorded the 1963 version that led to Liverpool adopting it as their motto and team song), which reached number one in the UK Singles chart. Read about our approach to external linking. Then flames licked the underside of the seats, which were a combination of wood and plastic. The local council was deemed to be one third responsible. Of the 56people who died in the fire,[2] 54 were Bradford supporters and two supported Lincoln. [22], Immediately after the fire, Sharpe planned and treated the injuries of over 200 individuals, with many experimental treatments being used. More than 3,500 people were crammed into the main stand area and this prevented people from moving away from the blaze quickly. It was later established that the blaze was caused by a fan who went to put his cigarette out but dropped it between the floorboards onto a pile of rubbish that had been building up below. [32] Speaking at the close of the case, the Judge said "They (the club) were at fault, no one in authority seemed to have appreciated the fire hazard. ", Hendrie: "We stayed in the pub for hours. 1.7M subscribers in the CatastrophicFailure community. Although there was no perimeter fencing, such as led to the devastating crush at Hillsborough, locked turnstiles meant that many fans who tried to escape by that means were killed or seriously injured. We couldn't breathe. Exactly 79 years to the day after the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire, another tragic fire occurred in New York City. We were sat in our football kit, we didn't know what to do. It was the brainchild of Bradford City fan Lloyd Spencer with all profits going to the Bradford Royal Infirmary Burns Unit.[43]. [2] The main stand was described as a "mammoth structure", but was unusual for its time because of its place on the side of a hill. [14] It took less than four minutes for the entire stand to be engulfed in flames.[11]. Yet in 2015, allegations surfaced which shifted the focus to the club's then chairman, Stafford Heginbotham. They wouldn't let us because then people would get in the way of fire engines, ambulances and police trying to get in. Witnesses of the fire have come to terms with the tragedy in different ways. Some had been crushed as they tried to crawl under turnstiles to escape. Previous warnings had also been given about a major build-up of litter in the cavity below the seats in the stand. Bradford City had just won the Third Division Championship and a record number of spectators over 11,000 had turned out to see the club presented with its first piece of league silverware in 56 years. [34], During the case, Sir Joseph Cantley stated that: "It is only right that I should say that I think it would be unfair to conclude that Heginbotham, Tordoff, the Board of Directors, or any of them, were intentionally and callously indifferent to the safety of spectators using the stand. "All you could see was black cloud. As we move ahead on the 2030 Sustainability Roadmap, sustainability projects are taking center stage. The name of the event comes from its culminating ceremony: the symbolic burning of a large wooden effigy, referred to as the Man, that occurs on the penultimate night of Burning Man, which is the Saturday evening before Labor Day. Led by former England international Trevor Cherry, the Bantams won only their third divisional title and earned a return to the second tier of English football for the first time since 1937. 1908 - Rhoads Opera House fire, Boyertown, Pennsylvania, killed 170. However, the responsibility of the Club is, in my view, very much the greater and I apportion responsibility between the two defendants as to two-thirds on the first defendant and one-third on the third (sic) defendant. "That was the legacy of the tragedy. "That's when I thought 'this is time to get out of here'. ", ITV football commentator John Helm, who provided live commentary of the unfolding disaster across the nation: "We wouldn't normally have covered that game - no question about it. The plastic surgeon who treated the injuries of over 200, Professor David Sharpe, went on to set up a world-renowned burns research facility at the University of Bradford. The main stand at Bradford was not surrounded by fencing, and therefore most of the spectators in it could escape onto the pitch if they had been penned in then the death toll would inevitably have been in the hundreds if not the thousands. "It is the little things that show how much people are still involved the fire still has a big impact on people. The horrific scenes of people burning alive seemed to live on in an eerie silence as daylight broke over the remains of Bradford City Football Club's ground yesterday. I do not include the people currently running the club, who have always displayed a great, sensitive duty to the memory of those who died. We accepted it was an accident, nobody wanted to blame the club because it was the club we wanted to support. Following his own 15 year investigation Into the fire, which killed four of his family members while he escaped, former tax accountant Martin Fletcher released 56: The Story of the Bradford Fire (2015). However, when Bradford City won promotion to the highest level of English football, Division One, in 1908, club officials sanctioned an upgrade programme. Since 1903, when the club was formed, Bradford City Association Football Club had played their home games at the ground. I remember trying to make sense of what was going on. The club's success had swollen the crowd to 10,000 and arguments will rage about fire precautions at the ground. All Rights Reserved. It was also a catalyst for the substantial redevelopment and modernisation of many British football grounds within the following thirty years. The stand slopes downwards from the South Parade. He had to undergo counselling and was unable to go to another game for several years. Coach Terry Yorath described the events as "the worst day in my life. The stand had already been condemned, and the demolition teams were due to start work two days later. Following the hearing in 1986, a test case was brought against the club by David Britton, a police sergeant serving on the day, and by Susan Fletcher, who lost her husband John, 11-year-old son Andrew, John's brother Peter and his father Edmond in the fire. Only then do you realise the huge network of people the fire involved. On the recording are Dene Michael (Black Lace), The Chuckle Brothers, Clive Jackson of Dr & The Medics, Owen Paul, Billy Pearce, Billy Shears, Flint Bedrock, Danny Tetley and Rick Wild of The Overlanders. On 11 May 1985 a blaze ripped through Bradford City stadium's wooden structure in minutes as the club played Lincoln City in an end of season match. The flames suddenly appeared and the whole roof took alight,' he said. We went over to the policeman stood at the corner flag and asked if it was being sorted out, and he said it was under control," Harrison says. Bradford City fire: Police reveal who was responsible for 1985 Valley Many were burnt to death at the turnstiles gates, which had also been locked after the match had begun. His father Tony went back the following day and said: "I wondered how anybody had got out alive, but I also began to feel guilty that I had got out when so many hadn't." I dread to imagine how many more could have died if the wind had been blowing in the direction of the pitch, instead of away from it. The scene in there was one of silence and shock. BurningMan.NYC will announce the dates and process for the 2023 grant cycle on this site & all BurningMan.NYC social channels in early Spring. No one gave it the attention it ought to have received.. .. We went there to win the last game in front of a home crowd. He was actually one of the detectives involved in one of the gravest miscarriages of justices in the country, the murder of Carol Wilkinson in Bradford, where someone was locked up for 20 years for a murder he didn't commit."[60]. "I want the truth to be out, the myths to be broken, so that I can get on with my life rather than knowing this information and having to live with this information. Although I was only 12 at the time, 11 May 1985 is a day. And then suddenly, in the space of 120-odd seconds, it really kicked in. "Since then I have thought of everything we could have done, but we didn't have the presence of mind to run across the pitch and tell people to get out. Stadium disasters have blighted the world of sport throughout modern history. When Town reached the Midland Road side of the pitch, he was faced with horrific scenes of the injured being treated and comforted by ambulance crews, fans and players. The two sides met for the first time after the fire in April 1989, when they arranged a benefit match in aid of the Hillsborough disaster, at Valley Parade. "[27], After controversial comments made by Popplewell about the Hillsborough Disaster, Fletcher raised further concerns about the events following the fire saying that "I have many unanswered questions still about the fire in which four of my family died, as does my mother. It was during this treatment that Sharpe began to develop the Bradford Sling,[21] which applies even pressure across sensitive areas. Fletcher, who was 12 at the time of the fire, does not make any direct allegations but he does believe Heginbotham's history with fires resulting in payouts of around 27m in today's terms warrants further investigation. [11], The fire escalated very rapidly, and flames became visible; police started to evacuate the stand. [12] The work was expected to cost 400,000 (1.3million today). The Bradford way was keep it to ourselves - it worked collectively that we did that. Warning: Some readers may find parts of this content distressing. We went there to win the last game in front of a home crowd. At the time of the disaster, many stadiums had perimeter fencing between the stands and the pitch to prevent incidents of football hooliganism particularly pitch invasions which were rife during the 1980s. Bradford city council officials, off-duty policemen and guests from Bradford 's twin town, Munchengladbach, were there to celebrate. He agreed that the inquiry into Bradford, led by the judge Oliver Popplewell, was inadequate and that there are many unanswered questions. [56], On 17 April 2015, retired Detective Inspector Raymond Falconer, in a report by the Bradford Telegraph and Argus, said the police were aware of an Australian man who admitted to starting the fire. This included the banning of new wooden grandstands at all sports venues in the UK. 05/12/15 AT 9:58 AM BST Crowds on the pitch at the Valley Parade stadium after a stand caught fire Getty Images Police have revealed the identity of the man who they believe was responsible. "Could any man really be as unlucky as Heginbotham had been?" "But the feeling here is that it is hard to believe that someone would purposefully start a fire. Burning Man - Wikipedia The fire claimed young and old alike, with most fatalities occurring at the rear of the stand where people sought escape only to find turnstiles locked. England won the re-match 64. [26], In July 1985, an inquest was held into the deaths; at the hearings the coroner James Turnbull recommended a death by misadventure outcome, with which the jury agreed. "The letters that went to the club, the council's failings, the police's failings, even as supporters we allowed a culture where the gates were locked. People ran onto the pitch with their clothes on fire while others were trapped at the back of the stand where they had gone to try to escape through the turnstiles. The scene in there was one of silence and shock. Yet many of those with terrible memories of the tragedy also take heart in the compassion born out of the devastation. The fire at Bradford City's Valley Parade stadium in which 56 people died and more than 270 were injured is remembered 25 years on. The next day work began on clearing the burnt out shell of the stand, and Justice Popplewell released his findings into the disaster. By this date the appeal fund set up for survivors had paid out more than 4m with further payouts expected as the effects of physical and mental injury were determined. Funnily enough I was thinking 'I'm going to miss the second half at this rate'. 56 people dead. The Bradford City stadium fire was the worst fire disaster in the history of football.. Burning Man Countdown | Burning Man He photographed the blaze from start to finish and the police will use this as evidence when an inquest is held. By the time they got back, the whole thing had taken off. (2015), 2003 Football League Third Division play-off final, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bradford_City_stadium_fire&oldid=1141323458, Fire disasters involving barricaded escape routes, Pages containing London Gazette template with parameter supp set to y, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles with unsourced statements from October 2010, Articles with unsourced statements from October 2021, Articles needing additional references from May 2018, All articles needing additional references, Articles needing additional references from December 2018, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Fan attempted to extinguish a lit cigarette, it slipped through floorboards and fell on rubbish, igniting it. Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire - HISTORY The blaze, at the Happy Land Social Club in the Bronx, killed 87 people, the . Criticising Bradford City during the case, Mr. Michael Ogden QC, highlighted that the Club 'gave no or very little thought to fire precautions', despite repeated warnings. "I saw people die in the stand - but it was only until then that I realised the scale of it.". 56 dead and hundreds more injured. Representatives from the fire brigade were due to go to the club tomorrow to inspect it and see whether regulations were being observed. Funnily enough I was thinking 'I'm going to miss the second half at this rate'. Within five minutes the whole stand was engulfed in flames. Lincoln City suffered two successive relegations, first to the Fourth Division in 1986, and again in 1987, becoming the first team to be automatically relegated from the Football League itself. Hendrie: "Us players must have been in the tunnel for seconds - and I mean seconds. ", On 26 January 2016, the IPCC declined calls for an investigation and published its full response online. They were not able to use water on the stand immediately because this would have hampered attempts to rescue people being dragged by the police and friends from the stand. The inquiry into the disaster, chaired by Sir Oliver Popplewell and known as the Popplewell Inquiry,[25] led to the introduction of new legislation to improve safety at the UK's football grounds. "[35], The total amount of compensation to the 154 claimants was reported to be as high as 20million, with the payouts covered by insurance taken out by the club. Heginbotham died in 1995, aged 61, and was never prosecuted for the stadium fire, despite the coroner later saying he had given serious consideration to bringing a charge of manslaughter as the club had failed to act on three separate warnings about a potential fire risk. The fire happened during a football match. Uncensored coverage of the fire was transmitted minutes after the event on World of Sport and the BBC's Grandstand after the video cassette was physically driven to Yorkshire Television. It remains to be seen whether a new investigation will take place.
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