One dead in seaside blaze

One person has died and four are still missing after a massive hotel fire in the Cornish seaside town of Newquay.Panicked guests tried to escape through the windows of the Penhallow Hotel as the blaze rapidly engulfed the building shortly after midnight.A man in his 40s died trying to jump to safety.The building has suffered major structural damage as a result of the blaze and floors have collapsed, rendering it unstable. It is high season and the hotel was believed to be full.Fire investigators are waiting for the shell of the gutted seafront hotel to be made safe before they can establish the full death toll.Four people are still in hospital one, in their 70s or 80s, in a critical condition.A police spokesman said: "Through the day we have been working with the manifest from the holiday company and interviewing people at the scene."The numbers have always been in a state of flux and at the moment we are as sure as we can be that there are four people unaccounted for."Demolition crews moved on to the site this afternoon to make it safe for fire and police investigators.A full search of the rubble is now not expected to be carried out until the morning.Chief Constable Stephen Otter said concerns about the missing people were growing."The longer we go on the more concerned we become for the welfare of those people," he said."We have to investigate what happened along with the fire service and that will take time."The people in hospital are suffering from injuries from falling down, burns and especially the elderly people are suffering from the trauma of the whole thing."Chief fire officer Matt Littmoden said he was confident once investigators had access to the site they would be able to find the cause even though the building had been badly damaged."The more fire damage there is the harder it will be to determine the cause, but we have some very experienced fire investigation officers on the scene and a specialist fire investigation contractor to assist us so I am convinced if there is a cause to be found we will find it," he said.He added that the building had a wooden fire escape and had its last safety inspection in 2006.The Penhallow Hotel is owned by Holdsworth Hotels which also has hotels in Torquay, Eastbourne and the Isle of Wight. It is part of the Robinsons Holidays group, based in Blackburn, Lancashire.At its height the fire was tackled by more than 100 firefighters.Chris Findon, who owns the Tregella Hotel next door, said her husband Alan made a desperate attempt to help the guests."We had evacuated our hotel and we saw a person banging on a third floor window. My husband went round and kicked the back door down but couldn't get through the next door. The police then arrived and asked him to leave. He just wanted to help people."© Independent Television News Limited 2007. All rights reserved.

ITN | August 18, 2007

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