Fire tragedy in Bedburg-Hau
Four dead in fire in retirement home: 71-year-old resident suspected
View into the room of the retirement home where the fire is said to have broken out that night.
© picture alliance/dpa | Christoph Reichwein / Picture Alliance
A fire breaks out in the middle of the night in a retirement home on the Lower Rhine. Any help comes too late for four residents. Investigators have suspicions about how the fire started.
Fire, soot and rescuers who break windows in dire need: four residents are one in a fire in Bedburg-Hau on the Lower Rhine died in a retirement home. 21 people were injured and taken to hospitals, police and prosecutors said. The fire department reported “dramatic scenes of rescue” that took place in the town close to the border with the Netherlands. The emergency services were able to bring a number of people to safety.
A 71-year-old resident is suspected of negligently causing the devastating fire.
According to the authorities, the dead were two women, aged 50 and 74, and two men, aged 66, who had lived in the residence.
The injured included 3 seriously and 15 slightly injured residents. In addition, a firefighter, a police officer and an employee of the residence were slightly injured. In an initial assessment in the morning, the police initially assumed there would be more injuries. 46 more people were evacuated.
71-year-old resident under suspicion
The fire probably broke out in a room in the retirement home and spread from there to other rooms. The public prosecutor’s office in Kleve started corresponding investigations. “These are directed against a 71-year-old resident who is suspected of negligently causing the fire,” she said. No further information will be given for the time being – the presumption of innocence applies.
According to a spokesman, the fire department was alerted at 3:50 a.m. by the automatic fire alarm system. One room was completely on fire, he reported. There was also so much smoke in the hallway that the residents could not be saved this way. That made things more complicated.
“Windows were broken, people were thrown out,” said the spokesman for the Bedburg-Hau volunteer fire department about the dramatic minutes. “It’s not a standard nursing home either. There are also residents here with a psychiatric history who didn’t understand what was happening,” he said.
NRW Interior Minister Herbert Reul (CDU): “That blows your mind”
Initial reports quickly suggested that the fire had broken out in a relatively limited area, but then spread and produced a lot of smoke. Anyone who looked at the building from the street after the fire could not initially see the burn marks. But that changed when we looked inside – there we saw soot on the walls and on the floor. There are also hastily left behind wheelchairs, walkers and slippers. In the morning there was still a smell of burning in the air.
However, the emergency services got the fire itself under control relatively quickly. North Rhine-Westphalia Interior Minister Herbert Reul (CDU) said at the scene of the fire: “There is such a small fire in a room. And suddenly human lives are over.” That makes me sad. “That blows your mind.” NRW Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst (CDU) wrote on the online platform X (formerly Twitter): “This tragedy is simply terrible and affects you.” As the body bags were taken away, staff placed flowers on them in front of the home.
House no longer habitable
According to the fire department, the house was no longer habitable. Residents were taken by bus to two senior citizens’ facilities in Goch and Kleve. A citizen hotline was set up for relatives.
The operator of the retirement home explained that the top priority now was to assist and support those affected in every possible way. “Of course, we are cooperating closely with the police and fire brigade to process the tragic incident and determine the exact cause of the fire,” it said in a statement. However, the fire protection measures in all of the operator’s facilities are “regularly checked and comply with applicable safety standards”.
Already 26 fires in retirement homes this year
Fires in nursing homes always have dire consequences. When a fire broke out in a nursing home for the mentally ill in Reutlingen (Baden-Württemberg) in January 2023, three people died. A mentally ill woman set her bedclothes on fire. There was also a fire with three deaths in a retirement home in Wardenburg near Oldenburg (Lower Saxony) in September 2022.
Eugen Brysch from the German Foundation for Patient Protection took the tragic incident in Bedburg-Hau as an opportunity to call for improvements in fire protection. “The number of fires in nursing homes remains at a consistently high level; in the first three months of this year alone there were 26 fires,” explained the foundation board.
He calls for a legal requirement that every patient and staff room should be equipped with independent extinguishing systems. Most residents simply couldn’t get themselves to safety. “Sprinkler systems could save lives here and significantly minimize property damage,” said Brysch. “What has long been standard in furniture stores and warehouses must also apply in nursing homes.”