We’ll be closing this blog shortly. Our full story on the fire is here:
Summary
Here is what we know so far about the fire that broke out at the Loafers Lodge hostel in Wellington, New Zealand:
At least six people are dead after a “worst nightmare” fire at a 92-room hostel in New Zealand’s capital, Wellington. The hostel was reportedly at or near capacity.
Authorities expect the death toll to rise, as 11 people are unaccounted for, though the hospital was home to many shift workers, so some residents may not have been there.
The hostel was home to a number of shift workers, elderly people, health workers and people in vulnerable housing conditions, according to residents, advocates, and the local health board.
Emergency services are determining how to access parts of the building, which have collapsed or might otherwise be dangerous to enter, in order to look for bodies. Brendon Nally, the Deputy National Commander of New Zealand’s Fire and Emergency services, said, “The building is quite significantly damaged,” and that parts of the roof had collapsed.
The Loafers Lodge caught alight overnight, prompting an evacuation at the four-storey hostel in the southern Wellington suburb of Newtown.
Around 90 emergency personnel responded to the blaze, which was doused around sunrise on Tuesday. Aerial trucks winched five people to safety.
Police have urged anyone with information around the whereabouts of occupants to come forward.
“This is a major event,” New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said. “We’ve not seen something on this scale in recent times.
Australia’s Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, described the fire as a “dreadful human tragedy” and offered Australia’s help.
People living and working close to the building were warned to keep their windows and doors closed to limit their exposure to the fire – they should also turn their air conditioning off and avoid touching materials from the fire, because of the asbestos risk. But the “health effects from asbestos released from fires is generally considered low risk,” RNZ reported.
New Zealand’s Chief Coroner, Judge Anna Tutton, warned that identifying victims would take time. In a statement she said, “The identification of people who have died in a fire can be a complex and time-consuming process. It is critical that that identification process is conducted properly and that no mistakes are made,” she said.
The hostel building recently passed a fire inspection. New Zealand’s Housing Minister, Megan Woods, says the hostel building passed a fire inspection conducted in February this year. “This building complied with all its obligations that it needed to fulfill as a building as recently as early this year - it was inspected in February, and issued with its BWOF on the third of March,” said Woods.
Hostel building recently passed fire inspection
New Zealand’s Housing Minister, Megan Woods, says the hostel building passed a fire inspection conducted in February this year.
“Under the Building Act, a building such as this was not required to have sprinklers,” Wood told RNZ.
“So this building complied with all its obligations that it needed to fulfill as a building as recently as early this year - it was inspected in February, and issued with its BWOF on the third of March.”
The New Zealand Professional Firefighters Union has said its firefighters are “devastated” by this morning’s events and will not be speaking to media. In a comment reported by the New Zealand Herald, a union spokesperson said:
“Out of respect for the deceased and injured their loved ones, and the devastating impact this fire has had on the responding firefighters and 111 emergency call centre operators the NZPFU will not be making any media statements at this time. The firefighters are devastated,” they said.
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has again expressed his condolences, writing on Instagram, “This morning I went and thanked the Fire and Emergency crews attending the tragic event at Loafers Lodge in Wellington. Alongside our other first responders they have done an amazing job in horrific circumstances. I know the whole of New Zealand appreciates their bravery and their service. Our thoughts are with the victims of this terrible tragedy and their families.”
Here are some pictures from the scene:
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins speaking to the media earlier:
Deportee advocate Filipa Payne has told RNZ that there were a number of 501 deportees staying in the lodge, not all of whom are accounted for.
501 deportees are people who have had their Australian resident visas cancelled and have been sent back to New Zealand.
“I don’t believe they are all accounted, I believe from my information that there is one, possibly two, that are unaccounted for,” Payne told RNZ.
“These are people who have been through a lot of trauma and have been really displaced in this country and stuck in accommodation because they were vulnerable and had nowhere else to go.”
Updated
Nurses all accounted for – local media
We reported earlier that nurses were staying in the hostel when a fire broke out. Stuff.NZ reports that they are now all accounted for, according to an unnamed source, and none are injured.
In a statement, police have asked people who were staying in the hostel or are looking for someone who was to contact them – “Police are using these reports, as well as other information from our community partners, to help determine who was in the building at the time and ensure their welfare,” they said.
The police added that there would be an update this afternoon on their progress:
Police are urging people who were staying in Loafers Lodge on Adelaide Road, Newtown in Wellington in recent days and are safe, or anyone concerned for someone, to please get in touch with Police. They are asked to call 105 and reference Operation Rose, or go online to https://www.police.govt.nz/use-105#online-report-options and select the form “Something Else”, referencing Operation Rose.
Police are using these reports, as well as other information from our community partners, to help determine who was in the building at the time and ensure their welfare. We are aware of information circulating relating to number of deceased and number of unaccounted for, however, until more is known Police will not be in a position to confirm numbers. Police will provide an update on progress to date this afternoon.
Updated
Identifying victims can be 'complex and time consuming' says Chief Coroner
New Zealand’s Chief Coroner, Judge Anna Tutton, has released a statement saying, “The identification of people who have died in a fire can be a complex and time-consuming process. It is critical that that identification process is conducted properly and that no mistakes are made,” she said.
“Coroners will be working hard with Police to ensure that the victims are identified correctly, to enable them to be reunited with their families as soon as possible. In the meantime, I want to reassure families that those who have died are being treated with respect and dignity by all those involved”.
Updated
People nearby warned to close doors and windows
There are six emergency crews onsite at the moment, RNZ reports, including an Urban Search and Rescue Squad with drone operators and technicians who are assessing the structure in order to try to find a safe way into the building.
“Once we’ve gained access to the building following structural integrity process, we will work on mopping up hotspots to allow for the investigation process,” District manager Nick Pyatt says.
“At this stage any cause of the fire or any other details around the circumstances of the fire are cannot be confirmed,” Pyatt told RNZ.
He also said that people nearby should keep their windows and doors closed to limit their exposure to the fire – they should also turn their air conditioning off and avoid touching materials from the fire, because of the asbestos risk. But the “health effects from asbestos released from fires is generally considered low risk,” RNZ reports.
Updated
The hostel was mainly “short-long-term accommodation, mainly transient accommodation,” Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has just told RNZ.
The government is working on emergency housing for those who have been displaced, she said.
Updated
Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has opened a Mayoral Relief Fund to accept donations from the public for those affected, Stuff.NZ reports.
“In crisis like this the generosity and community spirit of Wellingtonians is on full display and this fund allows us to provide support to people who have lost so much in this devastating fire.
“By donating to the Fund, we can ensure that people receive the immediate help they really need at this difficult time,” she said.
Nally just told RNZ, “what we know for a fact is that there is 11 people unaccounted for” but that the number of deceased persons is “not yet confirmed, but yes it is multiple”.
He says emergency services will “take the time we need to be absolutely certain of the cause” of the fire and that it is “too early to comment”.
Emergency services assessing options to access parts of building
Brendon Nally, the Deputy National Commander of New Zealand’s Fire and Emergency services, is talking to RNZ.
“The building is quite significantly damaged,” he says.
There are still parts of the building that firefighters can’t access, he said, but engineers are assessing options. Parts of the roof have collapsed.
Updated
One resident jumped out of his wondow and down two floors onto a rooftop, he told RNZ.
“I was on the top floor and I couldn’t go through the hallway because there was just too much smoke so I jumped out the window,” he said.
“It was just scary, it was really scary, but I knew I had to jump out the window or just burn inside the building.”
He has been treated for a sprained ankle.
A number of people who work for the local health service were staying at the hostel, the Capital & Coast and Hutt Valley District Health Board told RNZ.
The spokesperson was not able to confirm how many of the board’s staff were living there. He said they were working to confirm which staff members were safe.
Fire is a 'dreadful human tragedy', says Australian Prime Minister
Australia’s Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, has described a hostel fire in the New Zealand capital that claimed multiple lives as a “dreadful human tragedy”.
The prime minister said he had spoken with New Zealand counterpart Chris Hipkins following the fire, and offered Australian assistance.
“This is a dreadful human tragedy. I expressed my condolences on behalf of Australia to our friends in New Zealand at this very difficult time,” Mr Albanese told reporters in Melbourne.
“Any assistance of course will, as always, be available from Australia to New Zealand at what is a very difficult time.
Australia’s Trade Minister, Don Farrell, said it was not known whether any Australians were staying at the hostel.
“We’re trying to get as many details as we can about what’s happened, and in particular whether any Australians have been involved in this terrible fire,” he said.
Updated
Summary
If you’re just joining us, here is what we know so far:
At least six people are dead after a “worst nightmare” fire at a 92-room hostel in New Zealand’s capital, Wellington.
Authorities expect the death toll to rise, as 11 people are unaccounted for, though the hospital was home to many shift workers, so some residents may not have been there. Officials were privately bracing for dozens of fatalities earlier on Tuesday but inspector Dean Silvester said police’s initial assessment was that “fewer than 10” had died.
The Loafers Lodge caught alight overnight, prompting an evacuation at the four-storey hostel in the southern Wellington suburb of Newtown.
Around 90 emergency personnel responded to the blaze, which was doused around sunrise on Tuesday. Aerial trucks winched five people to safety
The hostel was reportedly at capacity.
Police have urged anyone with information around the whereabouts of occupants to come forward.
“This is a major event,” New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said. “We’ve not seen something on this scale in recent times.
Updated
Loafers Lodge resident Tamrat Isse Ada said he has lost everything except his jacket and phone. He has been living at the lodge for the past year. He happened to be going to the toilet when he realised there was a fire, he told Stuff.NZ.
“There was smoke and the alarm was going from upstairs,” he said.
“When I come from the toilet there was smelling everywhere, smoke ... people running everywhere. I just jumped to my room, and I take my jacket and my mobile, that’s it.” He escaped down the stairs and out the door. He could see nothing in the dark.
“I’m very sad, very sad. My neighbour, he’s missing, maybe he’s dead, police say there’s a lot of people missing. Very sad.”
Isse Ada has children in Australia and has spoken to them, he said.
Updated
RNZ reports that four people were taken to emergency at Wellington Hospital and one was then transferred to a different hospital because of the seriousness of their condition.
The three people at Wellington are in a stable condition, RNZ reports.
Updated
Number of dead still stands at six and is expected to rise
Emergency services are still expecting that “up to 10” people have died, Hipkins said.
He added that it is expected when crews enter the building that the number will rise.
Updated
Hipkins described emergency services as arriving to a “confronting” situation.
“Obviously, it’s quite confronting and also just to speak to the first responders on the scene in terms of what they dealt with when they arrived in the small hours of the morning, clearly a traumatic situation for them,” he told the media a few minutes ago.
“They’ve just had a crew change so some of people who were on the scene at the beginning will get a bit of a break now so I didn’t get a chance to see some of them. They will have already left the site but I want to acknowledge them in particular.”
Marie Murphy, the hostel’s property manager, has described the mix of residents.
“We’ve got everyone living there. We have nurses. We’ve had doctors, nurses, unemployed people, meat workers, hospital staff. All sorts of people. A real variety of people,” she told Stuff.NZ.
“This is very sad for a lot of people. Not only the ones who’ve lost their lives, but those who’ve lost their homes.
“There’s a lot of full time people. A lot have been there longer than I‘ve been there,” Murphy said.
“It just feels surreal. It doesn’t feel real. It’s very hard. It was a pretty bad fire. I’m feeling very sad at the moment.”
Updated
Grant Robertson, New Zealand’s Minister of Finance, said that the hostel was full – we’ve seen other reports that around three beds weren’t booked.
“I believe the beds were full last night,” he said.
The death toll still stands at six people – there was no update on that figure from Hipkins and Robertson.
Hipkins says he was alerted to the event between 6 and 7 am this morning.
“Obviously, my first concern was for the people on the scene here, so the people who potentially were trapped in the building and of course our first responders,” he said.
The local MP says a relief fund has been set up.
“This is a major event,” says Hipkins. “We’ve not seen something on this scale in recent times. Wellingtonians will feel this. Wellington is a small community and, you know, particularly here in this community. It’s a very tight-knit community. People will be feeling this today and I think, you know, I know the community will support each other, will give support to each other.”
Updated
Chris Hipkins is speaking to media now.
He says that there will be an investigation into the event.
“The police, the coroner, a range of different investigations take place and of course we will follow those and await any findings that come from those,” he said.
Another resident, Simon Hanify, said he knocked on his neighbours’ doors to alert them to the fire. He has lived in the building for five months, and, like the resident we quoted a short while ago, he said that fire alarms would often go off in the building, usually without reason.
“When I left my room I could smell smoke in the hallway so I went straight towards the kitchen and there was smoke coming down the stairwell,” he told RNZ.
“I just did a lap of our floor saying ‘everyone out, this one’s real’.”
He said that residents were unsure of where they would now find accommodation.
Another local resident, Chris Fincham, has told RNZ that fire alarms would regularly go off, but that none sounded during the fire. He knew something was happening when he heard someone shouting from the hallway, he said.
“I heard a voice coming down the passageway saying ‘evacuate, evacuate, the place is on fire’ — and I didn’t think much of it because the fire alarms would go off two or three times a week and we’d just ignore it.
“But then when I heard this guy, or this person, screaming ‘there’s a fire, evacuate’, I sat there for about five minutes and then I put my shoes on, got my wallet together, and I thought maybe I should leave.”
Updated
11 people unaccounted for
We have an update now on the number of people still accounted for after a fire at a hostel in Wellington, New Zealand.
Brendon Nally, the Deputy National Commander of New Zealand’s Fire and Emergency services, has just told Stuff.NZ, that emergency services are still searching for 11 people.
He said firefighters had saved “several dozen” people.
One of the residents of the lodge has said that there were people who were 80 or 90 years old living in the building.
A man who gave his name only as Chris told 1Newz he was worried that the building’s elderly residents would have struggled to get out.
“I grabbed my hat on the way and just started crawling — it was hard to crawl because there was only that much airspace on the ground,” he said.
“For me, it was hard, just that little distance, it was a struggle. You’ve got people in there like 80, 90, who aren’t able to look after themselves, especially in a fire, they will struggle.”
The hostel’s property manager has spoken to New Zealand’s 1News. Marie Murphy told 1News that many of the people who live in the hostel are shift workers.
This echoes what Brendon Nally, the Deputy National Commander of New Zealand’s Fire and Emergency services, said a short while ago.
While there were 20 people unaccounted for, he said, “That doesn’t mean that they’re all in this building, they would have gone to family and whānau - we know some of them are shift workers, they might still be at work”.
Wellington Regional Hospital has asked non-urgent patients to stay away today.
“Due to the active fire scene in Newtown today, emergency services have closed Adelaide Road between John Street and the Basin Reserve, limiting access to the hospital,” the hospital said.
“Patients who have non-urgent and safely-deferrable appointments are being rescheduled. People are asked not to call about appointments as they will be contacted if their appointment is affected”.
Authorities said 52 people were taken out of the building after being notified of the blaze at 12.25am.
More than 10 fire vehicles responded to the emergency across the morning and the fire was put out after 6am.
20 people still unaccounted for
It is currently just after 10.30 am in Wellington. An hour ago the Deputy National Commander of New Zealand’s Fire and Emergency services, Brendon Nally, told local media that 20 people were still unaccounted for.
He also said that the building did not have a sprinkler system. New Zealand’s building code does not require the retrofitting of sprinkler systems into existing older buildings.
He said it wasn’t possible that anyone still in the building could be alive.
“We have firefighters who did a fantastic job and have been at every part of the building where someone could be alive,” he told NewstalkZB.
It was a “hot, dense” fire, he said. The fire had damaged the structure of the building.
“We got as many out as possible. We are dealing with a building with asbestos and partial collapse,” Nally said.
“We are being diligent and methodical to deal with this building. The fire spread on all floors one specifically was the worst affected.”
Updated
Greens MP Golriz Ghahraman has tweeted:
Aroha and strength Pōneke. Some of our most marginalised are impacted and there will be tough questions but for now, we need to wrap around survivors. So grateful to our incredible tireless first responders. https://t.co/91W4yI1wm7
— Golriz Ghahraman (@golrizghahraman) May 15, 2023
The hostel has previously been contracted as an emergency housing provider in New Zealand, and where the housing crisis means a growing number of homeless people are housed long-term by the government in motels and hostels, but New Zealand Prime Minister Hipkins said the hostel was “not currently being used as emergency accommodation”.
New Zealand Prime Minister Hipkins said the fire was “an absolute tragedy”.
“It is a horrific situation. And in the fullness of time of course there’ll be a number of investigations about what has happened and why it happened.”
He said the hostel was “not currently being used in emergency accommodation”.
“But my understanding is that there will be a number of Ministry of Social Development clients.”
It was named by the Ministry of Social Development in a list of emergency housing providers released in 2021. Social service agencies including Wellington City Mission have said they had clients housed in the building, which advertises itself as providing affordable long and short term accommodation.
Updated
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins told the AM morning news program that he understands that six people have been confirmed dead and there are likely to be more. Police said they don’t yet have an exact count of the number of fatalities, but they believe it’s fewer than 10 people.
Hipkins, said at least six people had died. “I understand six confirmed previously and it looks like there are likely to be more.”
Hipkins said, “It’s a really concerning development and obviously our thoughts will be with all the firefighters involved and all the victims of the terrible tragedy that’s unfolding.”
Here is a photo of the fire taken in the early hours of this morning:
Adelaide Road is currently closed between John Street and the Basin Reserve due to a fire at a Newtown hostel. pic.twitter.com/25EUZxzevl
— Wellington City Council (@WgtnCC) May 15, 2023
Wellington Fire and Emergency District Manager Nick Pyatt told reporters, “I can sadly report that this will be a multi-fatality incident. Our thoughts at this time are with the families of those who have perished and with our crews who valiantly rescued those (they could) and attempted to rescue those that they couldn’t.”
“This is our worst nightmare,” Pyatt said. “It doesn’t get worse than this.”
Opening summary
A fire has broken out at a four-storey hostel in the New Zealand capital, Wellington, leaving at least six people dead, according to PM Chris Hipkins.
Police said they don’t yet have an exact count of the number dead, although they believe it’s fewer than 10 people.
Emergency services were called to the Loafers Lodge hostel about 12:30am.
Wellington Fire and Emergency District Manager Nick Pyatt said 52 people have been accounted for, but that a number still remained unaccounted for, according to Associated Press.
This is Helen Sullivan with the latest.
