Harold Mitchell (79) I got pushed down to the front and I remember looking around and suddenly this smouldering, small fire had taken over virtually half a block and was starting to hit the roof. The children were still nestled under the warden's thick overcoat when they discovered them. Treatment of casualties and Burns Research Unit, Dramatisations, documentaries and published works, West Yorkshire Metropolitan County Council, Learn how and when to remove this template message, List of accidents and disasters by death toll, List of United Kingdom disasters by death toll, "Hideous images linger after carnage of 'celebration' day", "Caught in Time: Bradford City win the Third Division, 1985", "EXCLUSIVE: Bradford's Valley Parade fire must be remembered like Hillsborough", "History of The Bradford Sling The Bradford Sling", "Bradford City football stadium blaze surgeon honoured", "Research centre to be living memorial to Bradford City FC fire disaster", "The Papers of the Popplewell Inquiry into Crowd Safety at Sports Grounds", "Popplewell Inquiry Bradford City Fire", "Bradford remembered: The unheeded warnings that led to tragedy", Joseph Canley summing up statement from test case court transcripts, Newspaper report from Sport and the Law April 21st 1989, "The Glasgow Herald Google News Archive Search", Los Angeles Times report on Bradford City test case findings, Court transcript from the test case brought by Susan Fletcher and Others against Bradford City and Others, "Bradford fire survivor attacks judge over Hillsborough comments", "The Story of the Bradford Fire: 'could any man really be as unlucky as Stafford Heginbotham? The smoke was choking. Please use the search above if you cannot find the record you require. The play reflects that it had been "the Yorkshire way" not to make a fuss, to bear a loss and move on. They are performed once every 10 years. With Bantamspast having been awarded a 50,000 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, Ian says it's now just a matter of people coming forward with their Valley Parade memories. Paula Helliwell, Unheard Voices project manager, said they wanted to hear from more residents who helped with the rescue effort outside Valley Parade, with the intention of recounting unheard stories from the time. contact the editor here. The match itself, however, had to be interrupted before half time as a fire quickly broke out, with memories of title celebrations now replaced with this horrible tragedy. It was on the 10th anniversary of the fire, 20 years ago, that Mrs Greenwood set up a fund, in the memory of her sons, offering the chance for young people in this place to take a journey of educational or cultural travel as she would have wanted her own two to do. Another player went into the office space to ensure there was nobody there. by Lord Beamish Fri May 11, 2018 12:44 am, Post Roy Mason (74) The residents also helped take victims to hospital. Craig Albert Stockman (14) Nellie Forster (64) 6/22/2021 - AP [49], Parrs Wood Press published Four Minutes to Hell: The Story of the Bradford City Fire (2005) by author Paul Firth;[50] the title refers to the estimated time it took for the stand to be completely ablaze from the first flames being spotted. Post by LoveCurryPies Fri May 11, 2018 9:09 am, Post They were immediately promoted back to the Football League in 1988, and survived for 23 years before being relegated again in 2011. Of the 56people who died in the fire,[2] 54 were Bradford supporters and two supported Lincoln. Ian Ormondroyd (born 22 September 1964) is an English former professional footballer who made more than 350 appearances in the Football League and Premier League. Four police officers, constables David Britton and John Richard Ingham and chief inspectors Charles Frederick Mawson and Terence Michael Slocombe, and two spectators, Richard Gough and David Hustler, were awarded the Queen's Gallantry Medal for their actions. A Gannett Company. This early part of the narrative is so readable that you wonder how Fletcher, a qualified accountant, did not wind up as a writer. One retired mill worker made his way to the pitch, but was walking about on fire from head to foot. [citation needed] Mathew Wildman, aged 17 at the time of the fire, commented that "I must have had five different experiments carried out on me with all sorts of new techniques for skin grafts and I had potions injected into me that helped my face repair naturally over time. Obviously never come to terms with what he saw, and that's 30 years on. Coach Terry Yorath described the events as "the worst day in my life. Club coach Terry Yorath incurred minor injuries while taking part in the rescue. (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. Burning timbers and molten materials fell from the roof onto the crowd and seating below, and dense black smoke enveloped a passageway behind the stand, where many spectators were trying to escape. 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. Thoughts and prayers to the 56 who lost their lives in this truly awful and harrowing tragedy. Popplewell's report was nowhere close to the quality of Lord Justice Taylor's report after Hillsborough, and since reading it as an adult I have always been very disappointed in it and considered it a poor piece of work. Gerald Priestley Ormondroyd (40) It detailed the safety work which would be carried out at Valley Parade as a result of the club's promotion, admitting the ground was "inadequate in so many ways for modern requirements". The book also raises concerns about the speed of the inquiry and the fact that it commenced a few weeks after the fire and lasted for only a few days, whereas other inquiries into similar incidents, pre and post the Bradford fire, have taken years to come to fruition and months to be heard. "It seemed that this should at least have been examined," Fletcher says. I was there 3 weeks before with Burnley. Muriel Firth (56) 26 years ago today. Fans flee to the pitch to avoid the flames in the wooden main stand, Mr Justice Popplewell, who led the inquiry into the fire, at the 'Turnstile Shrine' in the stadium (Rex), Martin Fletcher, author of '56: The Story of the Bradford Fire', A relative of one of the victims breaks down amid the ruins of the stadium (Rex), Thirty years after football's 'forgotten tragedy', the truth of what exactly happened when 56 people died in a fire at Bradford City's Valley Parade stadium remains elusive, Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in, Please refresh your browser to be logged in, Claims the disaster was started deliberately 'nonsense', Archives reveal the desperate rush to conjure an explanation, New evidence casts more doubt on verdictfirewas accident, BradfordCitystadiumfire: The untold stories of the 1985 fire, Extra 20% off selected fashion and sportswear at Very, Up to 20% off and extra perks with Booking.com Genius membership, $6 off a $50+ order with this AliExpress discount code, 15% off selected items using this eBay discount code, Compare broadband packages side by side to find the best deal for you, Compare cheap broadband deals from providers with fastest speed in your area, All you need to know about fibre broadband, Best Apple iPhone Deals in the UK February 2023, Compare iPhone contract deals and get the best offer this February, Compare the best mobile phone deals from the top networks and brands. Eight fires in the 18 years before the Bradford City fire were identified, many catastrophic and leading to large insurance payouts. The project, which began in February this year, is now. 15 Dec 2020. 56 fans died as a fire broke out at the game at Valley Parade, 54 Bradford supporters and two from opponents Lincoln City. A former Bradford City player is asking for people's memories of the club's past - both good and bad. Howard Malcolm Turner (41) Something caught my eye, he later explained. It's gone," he says. The playing area and stands were very basic but the ground had enough room for 18,000spectators. The fire was described as the worst fire disaster in the history of British football, and the worst football related disaster since 66spectators died at Ibrox in 1971. The stand became an inferno in about 5 minutes. 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. More than 250 others were injured in one of the. I was at a Scout camp at Bowley, we were listening to it on the radio in our tent..such a terrible tragedy. This site is part of Newsquest's audited local newspaper network. As a result, Bradford-born captain Peter Jackson was presented with the league trophy before the final game of the season with mid-table Lincoln City at Valley Parade on 11 May 1985. Irene Mcpherson (28) While Valley Parade was re-developed, Bradford City played games at various neighbouring grounds: Elland Road, Leeds; Leeds Road, Huddersfield; and Odsal Stadium, Bradford. We talk in the anonymous surroundings of his publisher's, in Bloomsbury's Bedford Square. Even if you're in a small town, it's the main focal point," says Ian Ormondroyd. But Ms Ibrahim saw her husband on her TV set, on the Valley Parade half way line, helping stretcher some of the injured away to safety. Fletcher said that "The club at the time took no actual responsibility for its actions and nobody has ever really been held accountable for the level of negligence which took place. by Lord Beamish Fri May 11, 2018 2:35 pm, Post On the pitch, referee Norman Glover had no option but to stop the game as the horror unfolded in front of both sets of players who could feel the heat from the flames even from the other side of the ground. He was helped out of the stand by other fans and spent a period of time in hospital. We had not been told anything. You could hardly breathe. The 1984/85 season had been one of the most successful in Bradford Citys 82-year history. It slipped through a hole in the floorboard. The information on housing, people, culture, employment and education that is displayed about Ormondroyd Avenue, Bradford, BD6 1HR is based on the last census performed in the UK in 2011. 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. As part of Bantamspast, Ian's actually hoping to dig a little deeper to find out just why some people choose to actively avoid Valley Parade completely on matchdays: "Perhaps we'll find out why they don't come. No follow up question. The timber construction of St. Andrew's Stand, Main Stand and the roof of its popular Railway End terrace were immediately condemned as fire hazards, which saw seating capacity briefly cut to nil. The most horrific scenes ever on tv. New legislation was introduced with the immediate closure of all wooden stands deemed unsafe, the banning of smoking within other wooden stands and the banning of any new wooden stands being built at all sports grounds. Two men were critically injured in an explosion and fire at a commercial building in Bradford, New Hampshire, on Thursday. Since then, it has been further re-developed and, today, Valley Parade is a modern 25,136 all-seater stadium, which is virtually unrecognisable from how it was at the time of the disaster, save for the original clubhouse that still stands beside the main stand, and the flank support wall that runs down the Hollywell Ash Lane at the "Bradford End". Most of the exits at the back were locked or shut and there were no stewards present to open them, but seven were forced open or found open. Ian says that Bantamspast is about much more than just the football: "It's where people come socially. ER 2005 . It was appalling that public money was given to the club while it was still owned by the same shareholders under whose direction the fire had happened. He had to undergo counselling and was unable to go to another game for several years. It's certainly how Mumtaz Ibrahim feels about the day when, as a newly married 20-year-old, she thought her young husband had been killed in the flames. [citation needed] Spectators later spoke of initially feeling their feet becoming warmer; one of them ran to the back of the stand for a fire extinguisher but found none. At 3.40pm, television commentator John Helm remarked upon a small fire in the main stand; in less than four minutes, with the windy conditions, the fire had engulfed the whole stand, trapping some people in their seats. Within a few hours of the blaze starting, it was established that 56 people had been killed, many as a result of smoke inhalation, although some of them had survived until reaching hospital.[11]. "We were concerned there might be, because of the rapidity of the fire, a mechanism unknown to us." When Bradford City played Lincoln City at Valley Parade on May 11th, 1985, what should have been an afternoon of celebration quickly turned into one of the worst disasters ever seen at a British football ground. Editors' Code of Practice. 05/12/15 AT 9:58 AM BST. It was nearly double the season's average of 6,610 and included 3,000fans in the ground's main stand. Edmond Fletcher (63) In terms of property types, flats in BD6 1HR sold for an average of 44,840 and terraced houses for 78,507. #RIP56 pic.twitter.com/w2OyUxT5as, Never forgotten #rip56 #bcafc ? March 3, 2022. by Spike Fri May 11, 2018 1:12 pm, Post "[16] As spectators began to cascade over the wall separating the stand from the pitch, the linesman on that side of the pitch informed referee Norman Glover, who stopped the game with three minutes remaining before half-time. It was a massive tragedy for everybody at the club.". [3], At the age of 33, Ormondroyd retired from football due to arthritis in his left ankle.[4]. Police worked until 4am the next morning, under lighting, to remove all the bodies. The Bradford Disaster Appeal fund, set up within 48hours of the disaster, eventually raised over 3.5million (11.3million today). Trevor John Stockman (38) The files show how the possibility of arson was not even touched upon or tested. And there are also repeated references to the smell of burning plastic. ("And Dad being Dad, he blagged it all like a dream."). RM 2F7YJ1C - Eccles, UK. However, the turnstiles were locked and none of the stadium staff were present to unlock them, leaving no escape through the normal entrances and exits. Published on 28/02/2023. City were presented with the Division Three championship trophy before kick-off and such was the air of excitement that over 11,000 people were at Valley Parade that day, almost double the usual average for the season. Frederick Hindle (76) The entrances to the stand were all at the rear and were higher than the rest of the ground. "I was out shopping in Bradford and he had gone to the match," she says. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. Although some attributed Lincoln City's sudden demise to the psychological effects of the fire on its players (together with the resignation of successful manager Colin Murphy shortly before the fire), it symbolised the wider crisis that the introduction of new safety legislation brought to Lincoln's Sincil Bank home. Previous warnings had also been given about a major . Bradford City F.C. Martin Fletcher, a survivor who lost 3 family members is convinced of it. Topic: 25 years ago today, the Bradford City disaster. [13], The match kicked off at 3:04pm and after forty minutes of the first half, the score remained 00,[14] in what was described as a drab affair with neither team threatening to score. This user liked this post: claretjohn33505. 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