Grenfell: Building a Disaster - Ep 4: Who Gives a Damn

The Grenfell Tower Inquiry Podcast

BBC

News

4.8 • 627 Ratings

🗓️ 4 September 2024

⏱️ 17 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A tale of “deliberate and calculated deceit”.

Beneath the cladding, a layer of insulation surrounded Grenfell Tower. This too was combustible and on the night of the fire, contributed to how quickly the flames spread. The companies which produced this insulation have been accused of misleading the construction industry about how combustible their products were.

In this episode, Kate looks through some of the most jaw-dropping evidence from the public inquiry. Internal emails and company documents expose how insulation companies tested, marketed and sold their flammable products.

Presenter: Kate Lamble Producer: Josephine Casserly Production coordinator: Janet Staples Audio engineers: James Beard and Gareth Jones Story consultant: Simon Maybin Editor: Penny Murphy

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts.
0:06.1	Fire Brigade.
0:07.5	Yeah, hello, hi.
0:08.5	In the fire, Flat 16, Greenfield Tower.
0:11.2	Sorry, a fire where?
0:13.3	Flat 16 Greenfield Tower.
0:15.7	W111TG.
0:17.8	In the early hours of the 14th of June 2017, Bahalo-Kibéi woke in Flat 16 of Grenfell Tower to the sound of a smoke alarm.
0:27.5	Stumbling out of bed, he saw smoke surrounding the fridge in his kitchen and called 9-99.
0:32.7	Right.
0:33.2	Quick, quick, quick.
0:34.6	They're on the way already.
0:36.3	Yes, I know it's burning, but they are on their way.
0:39.1	You've only just called as long as you're okay.
0:41.9	In less than 15 minutes, flames reached the outside wall of Grenfell Tower,
0:46.9	which have been covered in combustible materials.
0:49.5	Going up two to three floors and coming out of the second floor.
0:51.5	It's going to stop. It's gone. The first thing the flames would reach wasn't the cladding,
0:57.1	but an inner layer of insulation attached directly to the concrete shell of the building.
1:02.5	While the public inquiry into the disaster has previously found it was the cladding,
1:06.8	which was the primary cause of the spread of the fire,
1:09.1	the insulation, it said, contributed to how quickly the flames cause of the spread of the fire, the insulation, it said,
	...

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