Student tells of "panic"in Borough Halls fire

A Brunel student caught up in this week’s fire has told how panic set in after smoke began pouring out.

Radhika Thakrar, 18, a law student, was returning from from a seminar says she heard alarms coming from Borough Halls.

White smoke was pouring from the kitchen window of the building, said Radhika, who was one of the first people on the scene.

She said a security guard came up and told her: “This isn’t a false alarm… a girl came out twenty minutes late; she could have died.”

Ayesha Waseem, 19, a first year aerospace engineering student who also lives at the halls, said: “The walls have gone black and the stair case on the second floor is damaged”.

The London Fire Brigade said that the fire was started by an electrical fault.

Waseem said: “The university is doing a great job. On the night of the fire nine students from the third floor got medical treatment and got permanent accommodation while the rest of us were picked up by a mini bus and taken to a local Travelodge.”

The London Fire Brigade said it was called at 16:07 Wednesday 9th October and the fire was under control at 19:06. Ten fire engines and about 70 firefighters tackled the blaze that. The damage to the building is confined to the first, second and third floors, the fire brigade said.