The Boston Globe
Posted 3/1/2004 12:00:00 AM

DEATH TOLL REACHES 96 IN FIRE AT R.I. NIGHTCLUB; 187 HURT: Criminalprobe opens; search of ruins continues

IN SECONDS, ELATION TURNED TO HORROR

AS HOPES WANE, FAMILIES KEEP LOOKING FORANSWERS

DEATH TOLL REACHES 96 IN FIRE AT R.I. NIGHTCLUB;187 HURT
Criminal probe opens; search of ruins continues

Feb. 22, 2003

By Thomas Farragher and Douglas Belkin
The Boston Globe

WEST WARWICK, R.I. - A rock band's explosive light show ignited a lightning-quickblaze, a curtain of blinding smoke, and a panicked stampede to escape a hellishinferno that killed at least 96 people in one of the deadliest nightclub firesin US history.

Scores of Great White fans trying to save themselves Thursday night were trappedin doorways, squeezed so tightly that few could slip out as the fire, fueledby the acoustic insulation behind the stage, consumed the crowded building.

As emergency crews searched the ruins of The Station nightclub yesterday forbodies and evidence, state and federal authorities opened a criminal investigationthat initially focused on who was legally responsible for the indoor fireworksat the wooden, one-story building.

"I would say to let off pyrotechnics in that building you were asking fortrouble," said Rhode Island Governor Donald Carcieri, adding, "If there'scriminal wrongdoing, believe me, it will be pursued."

At least 187 people were being treated for burns and other injuries. Thirty-fiveof them were listed in critical condition last night with severe burns andsmoke inhalation.

The nightclub owners said the band did not have permission for the theatricalfireworks that signaled the opening of their late-night set around 11 p.m.The band said it had received that approval from the nightclub.

Authorities, who interviewedband members and club owners, said neither had the state and local approvalsrequiredfor a pyrotechnics display. Approvalwould have been "absolutely" denied if it had been sought, officialssaid.

Carcieri said investigators, led by the state attorney general's office, wouldseek to assess blame after the remains of all victims had been recovered andtheir families - some of whom searched frantically for loved ones at area hospitalsyesterday - had been notified.

"This building went up fast. Nobody had a chance," Carcierisaid. Hesaid officials believe the bodies of all victims have been found.

Scenes from the fire - whose chaos and carnage was reminiscent of Boston'sCocoanut Grove blaze that killed nearly 500 in 1942 - were captured by a Providencetelevision station that employed one of the nightclub owners, TV reporterJeff Derderian.

Derderian, at the club with a cameraman, escaped the fire and later was questionedby law enforcement officials.

The television images,broadcast worldwide by early yesterday morning, showed nightclub patronscheering withpumped fists and longneck bottles of beer asJack Russell, lead singer for the band Great White, began his set singing "DesertMoon."

As guitars wailed, pyrotechnics similar to Fourth of July sparklers explodedon stage, and the pumping fists turned to frantic hands pointing to the fire.

Almost immediately, flames licked acoustic material behind the stage and dancedacross the nightclub's ceiling.

Fire officials said the club was fully aflame within three minutes.

"I saw a wall of flame going up to the ceiling and it was just mayhem, panic," saidJohn Reagle, a drummer for Great White's opening act. "As soon as we madeit out the side door, everything went black inside."

Joe Barber, who livesnear the club, said he escaped by climbing over victims at a side door. "It was terrible, terrible," said Barber, who burneda hand helping others to safety. "People just clawing, scratching, punching- anything they could do to get out. You feel so helpless."

Some patrons at first believed the fire to be part of the act, then describeda chilling tableau of fear as patrons rushed for exits in smoke so thick theycouldn't see. Exits were quickly blocked by patrons felled by fire, smoke,or by chaotic trampling. Some broke a window and jumped through to safety.

West Warwick Fire Chief Charles Hall said the club's fire alarms were working,its fire extinguishers were workable, and its exit signs were lit. But hesaid the club was not required to use a sprinkler system because it was inoperation before that requirement was adopted, and because of its relativelysmall size.

"If there were sprinklers in this building, we wouldn't be standing hereright now," Hall told reporters. He said "any pyrotechnics in the interiorof a combustible building is unsafe."

As crews raked throughcharred timbers, a sometimes emotional Hall described a macabre scene insideTheStation. He said in the "panic and chaos," about25 bodies ended up stacked up at the nightclub's entrance.

Others were found near the club's three other operating fire exits, nearthe stage and the bar. Some, he said, were found in the club's restrooms.

Fire officials, he said,have a copy of the WPRI-TV tape of the fire's beginnings. "Anyvideo or any evidence that we can get is important," Hall said.

Russell, whose heavy metalband was nominated in 1990 for a Grammy, said the group has used the pyrotechnicdisplays "four or five" times sincethey began their most recent tour last month in Chicago.

"There's also been occasions when we've gone to the club and they said yes,we can use it, and we said, `No, it doesn't look safe,' " he said. "It'slike sparklers. You can put your hand over them. I stand there every night withmy arms over them and I don't get burned."

Russell's contention that he has always asked permission to use the pyrotechnicsand received that approval for Thursday night's show was immediately contestedby the club's owners. Michael and Jeffrey Derderian, who own The Station,said the band did not seek or receive that permission.

"At no time did either owner have prior knowledge that pyrotechnics weregoing to be used by the band Great White," they said in a statement issuedby their lawyer, Kathleen M. Hagerty. "No permission was ever requestedby the band or its agents to use pyrotechnics at The Station, and no permissionwas ever given."

The owner of a nightclubin Asbury Park, N.J., said Great White used the theatrical pyrotechnics duringa performancelast week without giving club managers advancenotice. "Our stage manager didn't even know it until it was done," saidDomenic Santana, owner of the Stone Pony.

One patron recalled a small fire during a show at The Station a year ago,but officials said there was no record of it.

Paul Woolnough, presidentof Great White's management company, said he did not know details about theapprovalprocess for Thursday night's show. "Partof this tour, they have been using those effects," said Woolnough. "Andit's always done on a case-by-case basis. . . . I would presume that permissionwas granted."

Hagerty said the Derderians,who purchased The Station in March 2000, are "devastatedand in shock over these events, which have claimed the lives of so many, includingtheir friends.

"Jeffrey Derderianwas in the club at the time the fire broke out, and assisted in helping toevacuatethe building during the fast-moving fire. Mr.Derderian was interviewed by state and local authorities [Thursday] night onthe scene and provided all information as requested."

The capacity at The Station, built around 1950, was 300. Fire officials saidthey believed there were fewer than 300 patrons there on Thursday night. ButCarcieri, compiling figures of those dead, injured, or safe, said there mayhave been as many as 350 people inside.

"There seem to be more people than we had been led to believe," theRhode Island governor said.

Investigators are examining additional pyrotechnics found on the site, butdid not assess their significance.

Carcieri said seven bodieshad been identified by last night. Eight more are expected to be quicklyidentifiedby "visual inspection." Five teamsof forensic pathologists from around the country are headed for Rhode Islandto help state authorities identify remains, using dental records and DNA.

Emergency crews adopted a somber ritual at the burned-out wreckage. Firefightersremoved their helmets and paused for a moment of silence when a body was discovered.Fire chaplains said prayers over the remains. Officials said the club's 1,700-square-footbasement was badly flooded and would have to be pumped out to determine whethermore bodies are there.

"This is really a tough, tough day," said Carcieri, who spoke witha couple who escaped the club through a rear entrance. "Their descriptionto me was that in 30 seconds, if you weren't out of that building in 30 seconds,you didn't have a prayer."

The scene was bathed in floodlights last night as work continued. During theday, a large section of the busy thoroughfare was closed as a large constructionexcavator knocked down remaining support beams and helped clear rubble. Firetrucks were positioned to block onlookers' view of the recovery effort.

The blaze at the nightclub 15 miles southwest of Providence was the deadliestfire at a US nightclub since 1977, when 165 people died at the Beverly HillsSupper Club in Southgate, Ky. And it was the second deadly episode at a USnightclub in four days.

Twenty-one people died in a Chicago melee early Monday after a security guardused pepper spray on patrons after a fight broke out.

"An investigation has begun," said state Attorney General Patrick Lynch. "Theinvestigation will continue. But now is not the time to discuss the investigation.What is most important is notifying the victims' families and offering supportto the many Rhode Islanders who are suffering at this time."

As rescue workers raked through the wreckage, Julie Belson, 31, struggled torecover from the shock of surviving a fire she watched unfold.

"I was in the front row with my boyfriend and I saw it catch fire," saidBelson, a dental assistant from Rowley. "It was growing. It was really hot.The heat was like crazy. It burned off my bangs. My instinct was to grab my bag."

Belson was briefly lostin blinding, black smoke. Then she found a window. But not her boyfriend. "I don't remember if anyone helped me and I don'tremember landing," she said. "I just remember turning around andhe wasn't there."

Outside and badly shaken,Belson stumbled into her boyfriend, who was covered with soot and was listedlastnight in serious condition at Rhode Island Hospitalwith burns to his face and hands. "I couldn't believe how fast it allhappened," said Belson, who said she could spot herself and her boyfriendin the television tape of the fire."

I thought, `Oh my God.I'm going to die.' I couldn't see anything. We were all holding our breath."

(Geoff Edgers, John Ellement, Christopher Rowland, Jonathan Saltzman, MeganTench, and Joanna Weiss of the Globe staff contributed to this report, alongwith Globe correspondents Heather Allen, Peter DeMarco, and Jeff Nilsen. Materialfrom the Associated Press also was used.)

IN SECONDS, ELATION TURNED TO HORROR

Feb. 22, 2003

By Ellen Barry and Raja Mishra
The Boston Globe

WEST WARWICK, R.I. - Before the smell of burning flesh, before his knuckleswere bloodied by scrambling feet, before the yelling turned into inarticulatescreams, before he saw people with flaming hair and half-melted faces, everythingwas different.

Christopher Travis was singing in his pick-up truck.

For the last month, inpreparation for the show, Travis had been playing his Great White compactdiscs at topvolume on his way to and from the constructionsite where he works. He had first seen them live in 1986, when he was a hard-partying20-year-old, and despite the changes that followed - a marriage, a divorce,sobriety - few things make him pump the air in wild joy like the opening chordsof "Desert Moon."

While Travis was shavinga razor-edge into his goatee, Erin Pucino was checking her watch at the Shellstationcash register where she works, and 19-year-oldMike Ricardi was interviewing Great White lead singer Jack Russell for hiscollege radio show, "Jim and Mikey's Power Hour."

By the following morning, all three would-be survivors of one of the deadliestfires in US history, gazing into the smoking rubble where at least 96 peoplehad died: They would be wrenched out of dense piles of bodies, having gropedalong the floorboards of The Station and seen charred bodies in the snow outsidethe nightclub. Mike's friend Jim would be missing. Erin's friend Tammy wouldbe missing.

At 9 p.m., though, it was all anticipation. Travis, in a satin Harley-Davidsonjacket and black jeans, offered up the ticket he had bought for $15 at StrawberriesRecords. Past a bald bouncer, he stepped into a smoky club whose floor wassticky with beer. It wasn't the type of place you would take a first date,said one musician who had performed there.

Waitresses mingled throughthe crowd with racks of beaker-shaped shot glasses. The crowd, Travis noticed, "had a good buzz going." Great White'sguitarist played the first few chords of "Desert Moon" opening the11 p.m. set, and Travis was elated.

"I pumped my hands in the air," he said. "Ihad been waiting forthis for a long time."

The Station was a thicketof waving hands, dozens of hands curled into the heavy-metal "Devil's Horns" symbol,when the act opened with three fountains of sparkling fireworks. As the conesof fire grew behind him, Russellleaned into the microphone, silhouetted by flame. The stage was bathed in orangelight.

There was a moment, a pause. Twenty-six-year-old Rena Gersheris, carrying arack of shots, gazed at the sparks and decided they were part of the show.Travis, who said he had seen fire break out at The Station at another showlast fall, waited for someone to spring forward with a fire extinguisher andput out the fire as they had last fall.

"But nobody did anything," hesaid.

Pucino's friend grabbedher by the hand and said, "We're going now."

As captured on film, the waving hands suddenly moved differently: They pointedurgently toward the back-right corner of the bar, where one exit is. The musicstopped. One of the musicians said something into the mike; it sounded muffledand echoing.

A male voice said, "I'm just going to the door." A woman said, "Ican't move." Her voice rises to a shriek. "I can't!"

Then the power cut out. The fire poured up the wall onto the ceiling.

As he fell out of a sidewindow onto a deck below, Michael Ricardi, a sophomore at Nichols College,feltthe presence of his grandfather, a Worcester firefighterwho died in a burning building. "I went that way; you're not going to," Ricardisaid he imagined his grandfather saying. On the deck, wandering among charredand unconscious bodies, he was unable to cry, he said.

Pucino, a baby-faced 25-year-old, grasped her friends' hands tightly and madeit to the front door - but was crushed under 15 to 20 people who fell on topof her. Her arms flailed at the door's opening and her legs were crushed bythe weight of human bodies, Pucino said. Then she felt a hand grab her hand.Two women and one man were pulling her. They pulled her for two minutes, Pucinoestimates, and while the women lost their grip on her, the man was holdingher tightly when she fell, free, to the ground.

"I'd do anything for that man," Pucino said later. "Idon't knowwho he was. I saw his arms, but not his face."

For his part, Travis was knocked to the ground, and started crawling alonga wall as people stomped on his fingers. Hands pushed him forward, and he burstout through a side exit. There were people with their hair burnt off, and peoplewith chunks of skin missing, people with blisters all over. Some people wererolling in the grass. Some people were ripping their clothes off. Some peoplehad puffy winter jackets burning. On all fours, Travis realized that the smellin his nostrils was burning bodies.

"I've never smelled it before, but I knew what I was smelling," Travissaid.

Anthony Carsetti, who was driving home with a bag of dog food at 11:15, sawtwo people stagger out of the club's entrance. Then he saw a dozen, running.Some had hair on fire. Then their faces began to be charred. Some crawledout of the club on their hands and knees. Some of them walked around stunned.

"It looked like they were zombies coming toward us," saidKim Toher,a waitress at the Cowesett Inn.

At the inn, waitresses began filling bags with ice. The 130 to 140 people treatedthere were suffering from second- and third-degree burns and legs broken frombeing trampled. Those who escaped found, often, that the friend who had beenright behind them had been scorched in the seconds after they jumped out. A34-year-old Pawtucket man who identified himself only as John said he had letgo of his fiancee's hand only at the last moment, when he jumped through thewindow. Yesterday morning, when John was talking to reporters near the burnsite, his fiancee was in critical condition.

"She was only in there four seconds longer than I was," hesaid.

The patients were wrapped, mummylike, in gauze, and transported to area hospitals.Dr. Selim Suner, an emergency room physician, said about a dozen of the 60patients brought to Rhode Island Hospital have life-threatening injuries. Manyhave burns on their hands, suggesting that they were trying to crawl out ofthe club over a burning floor.

"I haven't ever seen the number of burn patients so concentrated as thisone," he said. "One by one, they just kept coming."

Shortly before dawn, a local pastor approached Russell, who was standing nearthe site of the fire answering questions from reporters.

"You could see he was just on the verge," said Dave LaChance, pastorof the New Song Christian Fellowship. "I just asked him if he wanted someoneto pray with. We just held on to each other a little bit."

The smell of carbon came and went yesterday morning, sometimes mingled withalcohol and sometimes, people thought, with rubber. After all four walls hadfallen, the entrance to The Station - a section of wall painted with a 6-foothead of Ozzy Osbourne - still stood.

Travis drove himself toKent County Memorial Hospital. The first thing he did when he got in histruck was play "DesertMoon."

He has an upwelling of wanting for the band members, and wants to give themhis condolences.

But he has decided not to go to any more live rock shows.

"Maybe it's time to grow up and move on," hesaid.

(Chris Rowland, Megan Tench, Tatsha Robertson, Douglas Belkin, Anne Barnard,and Jonathan Saltzman of the Globe staff and correspondent Peter DeMarcocontributedto this story.)

AS HOPES WANE, FAMILIES KEEP LOOKING FOR ANSWERS

Feb. 22, 2003

By Michael Paulson and Michele Kurtz
The Boston Globe

Early in the day, they arrived at the charred remains of the West Warwick,R.I., nightclub, pressing against the police tape, begging the firefightersfor shreds of information.

Throughout the afternoon, they called, faxed, e-mailed, and visited a dozenarea hospitals, offering photographs and descriptions to doctors trying toidentify the sometimes unrecognizable victims.

But by evening, many family and friends of concertgoers were losing hope thattheir loved ones might have survived the inferno that destroyed The Stationjust as the headline act, Great White, was finishing its first song.

The missing were people like Robert Croteau, a 31-year-old Great White devotee,who enthusiastically followed the band from gig to gig and who proudly hadthe band's logo, a shark, tattooed into his left shoulder. Croteau's familymembers fanned out to area hospitals, hoping against hope that he had survived.

There was the band's 28-year-oldguitarist, Ty Longley, who has not been seen since the ill-fated openingsong. His website was updated yesterday morningwith a plaintive appeal from his friends, "Come Home, Ty!"

And then there was MichaelGonsalves, a 40-year-old Providence disc jockey known as "The Doctor," whoclaimed to be the host of the country's longest-running heavy metal show,and who introduced Great White on Thursday.Six employees of WHJY-FM in Providence attended. Five came out alive, but Gonsalvesremained missing.

"We're frustrated and we're broken-hearted, and we're just hoping he's stillalive," said Bud Paras, WHJY's general manager.

Hospitals were deluged by family members trying to locate the missing. At MassachusettsGeneral Hospital, which was treating about a dozen victims, family memberslooking tired and scared paced the hospital lobby, while others talked in hushedtones to medical officials.

"My heart really goes out to the families who have a relative who they thinkwas involved in this fire," said MGH's Dr. Alasdair Conn.

"They have no ideawhere they are."

Barbara Kulz of Warwick, R.I., said she was sure her 30-year-old son, Michael,was at the Great White show because she spotted him in video from the concertthat was shown on television. Kulz said she and her husband have notified theRed Cross that Michael is among the missing, and they are frantically callinganyone who might be able to help find him.

"So many were lost in that fire, and so much time has gone by and mostof [the injured] have been identified," she said. "With so much time,we really don't have any hope. I know he was in the fire - that's definite.His friend wound up in the hospital. We're hoping for a miracle."

Last night, Michael's father, George, e-mailed a photograph of his son to Mass.General, where there was still one unidentified male survivor. After that,he planned to stay home and wait - he said there was nothing left to do.

"Him and I used to go to breakfast on Saturday morning," Kulz said. "It'sgoing to hurt."

For several hours yesterday, Patricia Belanger tearfully toted a picture ofher 30-year-old daughter, Dina Demaio of West Warwick, to area hospitals. Alegal assistant during the day, Demaio had been waitressing at The Stationfor several months to earn extra money as she raised her 7-year-old son.

Demaio normally waitedtables on weekends, "but because of the concertthey asked her to go in [Thursday]," said her sister, Kristy Garvey.

When Demaio didn't come home yesterday, Belanger drove to the club and foundher daughter's car outside the charred building. Later that afternoon, Belangerdrove to Mass. General hoping that one of the victims who had not been claimedby family members might be her daughter.

"She's not on any list that's out there," Belangersaid.

Meanwhile, family members struggled with what to tell Demaio's young boy.

"If he asks any questions, we're just telling him she's sick right now," Garveysaid.

Many of the victims, accordingto hospital officials, ranged in age from their late teens to their late30s. Most had one thing in common - their fondnessfor Great White, a metal band that debuted in 1982 and is best known for itsGrammy-nominated 1989 hit, "Once Bitten, Twice Shy."

The audience included men like Kevin R. Washburn, 30, and Michael Stefani,avid fans and best friends planning to move in together. Stefani, of NorthKings town, R.I., had seen Great White at least six times before.

Inside the club, the two split up. When Stefani emerged from the men's room,he watched the flames in horror. Unable to find Washburn, a forklift driverfrom Franklin, Mass., Stefani fled out a back door and then ran to the frontwhere he tried to help pull people out.

"I pulled one guy out. That's it," Stefanisaid.

Washburn was nowhere to be seen.

Among the missing were some of the people who helped organize and promote theshow.

Gonsalves, a New York City native and a longtime fan of heavy metal, beganhis career while at Rhode Island College working at the school's radio station.

"He was somebody who really loved what he was doing, and was just a goodfellow," said Gary Penfield, vice president for student affairs at RhodeIsland College.

Longley was born in Sharon, Pa., and joined Great White in 2000. He began hiscareer playing clubs in Sharon and is well-known in the small town, accordingto Sarah Adams, a news editor of The Herald, a local newspaper. According tohis website, he loves rum and coke and pizza and jogs as a hobby.

Yesterday, Nicole Fusco of Coventry, R.I., arrived at the club looking forher uncle, Tom Medeiros of Coventry, a 40-year-old worker at Bradford Soapin West Warwick who took a day off to make the concert.

She said she learned from one of his co-workers that he went to the club withhis girlfriend, Lori Durante of West Warwick. Neither of them had been heardfrom since.

Medeiros's maroon pickup truck was still parked in the club parking lot.

"We checked all the hospitals and he isn't on any of the lists," Fuscosaid. "We haven't heard anything."

As the day wore on, family members grew ever more anxious. By last night theydecided to gather for solace.

"He was a big fan of the band," said Andrea Silva, Medeiros's niece. "We'rejust together now."

Some families were frustrated by conflicting information. Relatives of Steveand Andrea Mancini of Johnston, R.I., were losing hope even as a friend saidshe had heard that the Mancinis had survived. With no certain word, familymembers faxed to Mass. General the couple's wedding photo, taken just 15 monthsago.

"The doctor on the phone said it doesn't match the description," saidDino Jacavone, one of Andrea's 10 brothers and sisters.

"Some people said they saw them get out," Jacavone said, his voicecracking. "But no one can find them. So we're just waiting."

The Mancinis worked thedoor at the club, he as a bouncer and she taking money; Steve, 39, also runsthefish department at a Stop & Shop in Providence,and Andrea, 28, helps direct her family's garden center in Johnston.

Steve has a third occupation: guitarist for the band Fathead, which openedfor Great White on Thursday night.

(John Ellement, Scott S. Greenberger, Tatsha Robertson, Christopher Rowlandand Megan Tench of the Globe staff contributed to this report.)