Fears over safety

Press, 21 November 1987, Page 10

Fears over safety

NZPA-Reuter London The fire that ripped through London’s King’s Cross station on Wednesday night killing 34 people has stirred fears over safety in the world’s oldest underground railway system. While mourners laid flowers yesterday on the blackened . steps of the station, a ? man and a woman fought for their lives in the intensive care unit of a nearby hospital. Twelve others were still classified as seriously ill. Police said the intense heat of the blaze, that roared up an escalator

shaft towards the end of the evening rush hour, meant some bodies had still not been identified. The fire started on a wooden escalator before engulfing a crowded ticket concourse and filling a labyrinth of tunnels with thif k, deadly smoke. ; The Transport Minister, Paul Channon, .announcing a public inquiry into the disaster in Parliament, said the London underground rail system carried hundreds of millions of passengers a year one of the safest in the world.