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The King's Cross fire broke out on wednesday 18 November 1987 at approximately 19:30 at King's Cross St. Pancras tube station, a major interchange on the London Underground. The fire killed 31 people and injured 100 people. As well as the mainline railway stations above ground and subsurface platforms for the Metropolitan lines, there were platforms deeper underground for the Northern, Piccadilly, and Victoria lines. The fire started on an escalator serving the Piccadilly line and 15 minutes after being reported, as the first members of the London Fire Brigade were investigating, the fire flashed over, filling the underground ticket office with heat and smoke. The subsequent public inquiry determined that the fire had started due to a lit match being dropped onto the escalator and suddenly increased in intensity due to a previously unknown trench effect. London Underground were strongly criticised for their attitude toward fires. Staff were complacent because there had never been a fatal fire on the Underground, and had been given little or no training to deal with fires or evacuation. The publication of the report led to resignations of senior management in both London Underground and London Regional Transport and to the introduction of new fire safety regulations. ==Fire== At King's Cross, as well as the mainline railway station above ground and subsurface platforms for the Metropolitan line, there are platforms deeper underground for the Northern, Piccadilly, and Victoria lines. There were two separate escalator shafts leading down to the Victoria and Piccadilly lines; the Northern line was reached from the Piccadilly line. Stairs connected the Piccadilly and Victoria line platforms and from these there was a subway to platforms used by British Rail ''Midland City'' (later ''Thameslink'') trains to and an entrance in Pentonville Road. At about 19:30 several passengers reported seeing a fire on a Piccadilly line escalator. Staff and police went to investigate and on confirming the fire one of the policemen went to the surface to radio for the fire brigade. Four fire appliances and a turntable ladder were dispatched at 19:36 by the London Fire Brigade. The fire was beneath the escalator, impossible to get close enough to use a fire extinguisher. There was water fog equipment but staff had not been trained in its use. The decision to evacuate the station was made at 19:39, using the Victoria line escalators. A few minutes later the fire brigade arrived and several firemen went down to the escalator to assess the fire. They saw a fire about the size of a large cardboard box and planned to fight it with a water jet using men with breathing apparatus. At 19:42 the entire escalator was aflame, producing superheated gas that rose to the top of the shaft enclosing the escalator, where it was trapped against the tunnels's ceiling, which was covered with about twenty layers of old paint. As the superheated gases pooled along the ceiling of the escalator shaft, all those old layers of paint began absorbing the warmth. The ceilings had been repainted several times in the past without removing the old paint. A few years before the fire, the Underground's director of operations had suggested that all this paint might pose a fire hazard. However painting protocols were not in his purview and his suggestion was widely ignored by his colleagues. At 19:45 flashover occurred and a jet of flames came from the escalator shaft filling the ticket hall with intense heat and thick black smoke, killing or seriously injuring most of the people in the ticket hall. This trapped several hundred people below ground, who escaped on Victoria line trains. Several policemen with an injured man attempted to leave via the ''Midland City'' platforms, but found their way blocked by locked gates until these were unlocked by a cleaner. Staff and a policewoman trapped on a Metropolitan line platform were rescued by a train. Thirty fire crews—over 150 firefighters—were deployed. Fourteen London Ambulance Service ambulances ferried the injured to local hospitals, including University College Hospital. The fire was declared out at 01:46 the following morning. Thirty-one people died and 100 people were taken to hospital, 19 with serious injuries. Fire Brigade station officer Colin Townsley was in charge of the first pump fire engine to arrive at the scene and was down in the ticket hall at the time of the flashover. He did not survive, his body being found beside that of a badly burnt passenger at the base of the exit steps to Pancras Road. It is believed that Townsley spotted the passenger in difficulty and stopped to help her. An initially unidentified man, commonly known as "Michael" or "Body 115" after its mortuary tag, was identified on 22 January 2004, when forensic evidence confirmed he was 73-year-old Alexander Fallon of Falkirk, Scotland. He was the subject of a 1990 Nick Lowe song, "Who Was That Man?".〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.oldielyrics.com/lyrics/nick_lowe/who_was_that_man.html )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「King's Cross fire」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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