As families gathered outside a hospital for updates, Tomco Stojanov had already been given the devastating news. His 25-year-old son, Andrej, had been killed Sunday in a nightclub fire that left dozens dead, many trampled during a desperate bid to escape.
“Thank you for your condolences, but my pain is incurable. The wound is incurable,” Stojanov said, holding up a photograph of his son, clean shaven and wearing a suit jacket.
North Macedonia is grappling with the loss of dozens of young lives in Sunday’s nightclub inferno in the eastern town of Kocani, while trying to hold those responsible to account and prevent another calamity.
Fire tore through the overcrowded Club Pulse during a live concert, leaving 59 people dead and more than 150 injured from burns, smoke inhalation and being trampled in the panicked escape toward the building’s single exit. Health Minister Arben Taravari said about 20 of the injured were in critical condition.
Videos showed sparkling pyrotechnics on the stage hitting the club’s ceiling and igniting the blaze as a band played.
The fire that shook the nation of two million — where close-knit extended family bonds made the disaster personal to many — was the latest in a string of deadly nightclub fires around the world. People as young as 16 were among the casualties and the nation declared seven days of mourning.
“We are all in shock, and I am shocked myself: as a mother, as a person, as a president,” North Macedonian President Gordana Davkova Siljanovska said in an address to the nation Sunday night.
Late Sunday, Kocani’s residents held a candlelight vigil in support for mourning families, waiting in long lines to light church candles.
Safety code violations
Authorities say they are investigating allegations of bribery surrounding the nightclub that was crammed with young revellers and at double capacity. And North Macedonia’s government ordered a sweeping three-day inspection to be carried out at all nightclubs and cabarets across the country, starting Monday.
State prosecutor Ljupco Kocevski said a preliminary inspection of the nightclub had revealed numerous safety code violations including a lack of emergency exits, an insufficient number of fire extinguishers and improper access for emergency vehicles.
The fire caused the roof of the single-storey building to partially collapse, revealing the charred remains of wooden beams and debris.
“The omissions are significant. I can confidently say that this is a failure of the system,” the prosecutor told reporters, also noting the lack of an overhead extinguisher system and fire alarms and the use of flammable materials to line the inside walls.
The country was in mourning as people watched harrowing scenes in the town of 25,000 people, where rescuers for hours carried out their grim task of removing the charred bodies of clubgoers.
A state coroner said the bodies were being brought for identification in batches from morgues due to the high number of people killed.
Officials said 10 people remain in police custody for questioning in Kocani, some 115 kilometres east of the capital, Skopje. Interior Minister Panche Toshkovski added that a preliminary inspection revealed the club was operating without a proper licence. He said the number of people inside the club was at least double its official capacity of 250.
Condolences poured in from leaders around Europe as well as from the office of the hospitalized Pope Francis.
Neighbouring and nearby countries — Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia and Turkey — along with a number of others have already accepted some 50 patients with the most serious injuries.
“All patients who have been transferred abroad are currently in stable condition. We hope it stays that way and that we will receive positive news from abroad,” Taravari said.
