The Tribune

By NICO SCAVELLA

Tribune Staff Reporter

nscavella@tribunemedia.net

THREE “high end” rooms at the El Greco Hotel were damaged after a fire reportedly broke out in the attic of the West Bay Street hotel in the early hours of Monday, according to senior hotel employees.

Hotel officials told The Tribune that while the cause of the blaze is still unknown, it likely started in the hotel’s large attic to the north of the building complex, before spreading throughout the roof and damaging some of the hotel’s “most expensive rooms” in the process.

One room in particular, room 14, sustained the most damage, after the “fire came straight through” from the roof, hotel employees said. “A number” of other rooms received “smoke damage,” according to Police Fire Services Chief Superintendent Walter Evans, although he said fire services personnel observed three rooms that were “directly affected” by the fire.

No guests or hotel personnel were harmed as a result of the fire, according Supt Evans, who added that all of the 17 rooms that were reportedly occupied by guests were successfully evacuated.

According to El Greco floor manager Hubert Knowles, it was between 2am and 3am when he, along with the security on duty noticed a large plume of smoke emanating from the northwestern section of the hotel. Mr Knowles said he and the security guard initially thought the fire was at the nearby Ichiban restaurant, prompting them to check it out.

“So we went out the building and ran around, and when we were running around the police were coming around to us telling us the hotel was on fire,” he said. “So I then ran back inside and pulled the fire alarm, I ran upstairs, the area the fire was in and I started banging on all the guest doors, letting them know they had to evacuate.”

Fire services personnel were subsequently notified, with crews from police headquarters and both the Cable Beach and Paradise Island fire station’s summoned to combat the blaze, according to Supt Evans.

Meanwhile, Mr Knowles said all of the hotel’s guests were evacuated without incident, after which he said he personally assisted fire services personnel in extinguishing the blaze, which took roughly an hour and a half, according to officials.

In a post-fire interview with The Tribune at the hotel, Mr Knowles revealed the extent of the damage El Greco had sustained.

“We had five king sized beds up there, five TVs, the suite has two beds,” Mr Knowles said. “Plenty damage. The roof even came in. All the bathroom fixtures, damaged too. The tubs, toilets in three of the rooms have to come out. You might could salvage two, in two of the rooms. But it’s plenty damage. I can’t really give an estimate how much, but it was a big loss.

“The good part about it was that some of those rooms were not occupied. They are our high-end rooms. They are some of our most expensive rooms but were not occupied.”

He added: “I suspect the fire started in the attic because we have an attic where we can access the air condition systems which covers the rooms. It’s a big attic and you can walk in it, but at the front entrance was plenty smoke and a little fire there, so we contained that but we couldn’t get down in the back to the next section.”

Mr Knowles said some of the guests opted to relocate to the nearby Marriott hotel, while other guests placed in a section of the hotel that was not damaged by the fire.

“We automatically gave some of them some refunds for the inconvenience,” Mr Knowles added. “And then some of them when they come back some of them are our regular customers, and we say we’ll discount them one or two nights. Everybody was in good standing. It wasn’t no problems.”