Stardust survivors have told an inquest jury of seeing flames racing across the ceiling of the nightclub in what one witness described as being like the film ‘Backdraft’, with something that resembled “drops of molten lead” or “acid” falling onto the crowd.
“Years later there was a film called ‘Backdraft’, and it was an absolutely identical situation in that film. A big ball of flames came out and it was turning and turning, and it came right across the ceiling,” Bernard Tully on Wednesday told the Dublin District Coroner’s Court, giving evidence during the inquest into the fire that killed 48 young people when it swept through the Stardust in the early hours of St Valentine’s Day, 1981.
Mr Tully, who was 16 at the time, told Gemma McLoughlin-Burke BL, a member of the coroner’s legal team, that there was “absolute panic, there was mayhem” and he could hear “the screams of people, the cries of people trying to get out”. He said that he went into the ticket office on the premises and tried to open a window, but it only opened about three inches.
“My life actually did flash in front of me, and at that stage I honestly thought I was going to die,” he said.
Mr Tully said he then remembered the glass panel at the ticket office, and he picked up a stool and smashed the window on top of the counter.
“The noise of people was harrowing, me and another chap got up onto the counter and threw ourselves out, I basically fell out the front door on top of people, we landed out on top of people,” he said.
“People were piled up that high, it was people on top of people on top of people on top of people. I jumped up to get on top of the people, I was on top of people’s heads,” he said, going on to say that he eventually got out the main door.
He told Bernard Condon SC, representing a number of families, that he tried to get into the Stardust a few weeks before the fire without paying, which he described as trying to “bonk in”, but the doors he tried were chained on the inside and only opened two to three inches.
Thomas Dempsey, who was 19 at the time, gave evidence that he saw someone using a fire extinguisher on the flames, but “it was like the extinguisher added to the flame”.
“It was just igniting the fire. It had gone up the sides of the walls, and it just took off. It got worse and worse, and it just took off, and the flames shot right across.
They seemed to give up on it, they just couldn’t control it,” he said.
The fire shot across that ceiling, the whole length of it, it raced across
“The fire shot across that ceiling, the whole length of it, it raced across. The carpet tiles fell like drops of molten lead, they were red hot, orange drops with black tails of smoke behind them. The whole place was dropping, and I would assume they started fires everywhere. The speed and the pace of the fire caught everybody,” he said.
Mr Dempsey said that once he got outside, there was “pandemonium.”
“I looked in the doorway and all I could see were faces in the Stardust, looking out panic-stricken, terrified, and behind them was just orange and black smoke on the ceiling. It was terrifying. Nobody had a plan, there was no organisation, there was nobody that seemed to be in charge,” he said.
The jury also heard evidence from Anthony Preston, who was present that night with one of the people who lost their lives, Margaret Kiernan. Mr Preston told Ms McLoughlin-Burke that the hallway to the main entrance was packed, and one exit door was open while the other door was closed.
We were behind that door like cattle, pushing and shoving
“We were behind that door like cattle, pushing and shoving,” he said, going on to say that he made his way up the stairs by feeling his way. He said there was smoke and fumes, and he held his breath until he made it up the stairs.
“People were giving up because of the fumes, they were dying before the fire got to you,” he said.
Mr Preston said that when he got upstairs, he started smashing the windows with his hands just to get air, and then two men dragged him out. He said he had previously gone to an exit door, but there was a bouncer there and the door was locked.
“It was locked with a big Chubb lock on it,” he said, confirming that the bouncer was telling people to go to the main entrance instead.
In response to questions from Brenda Campbell KC, representing a number of the families of the victims, including Margaret Kiernan’s, he said that people were “shoving and pushing and screaming and coughing”.
It was mayhem, horrible, you couldn’t do anything
“It was mayhem, horrible, you couldn’t do anything, so then the lights went out, then the smell and the fumes and the backdraft, you could feel the fire. Margaret had gone away from me because of the pushing and shoving,” he said.
Mr Preston said that the smell of the fumes was like “a bonfire, the smell of a tyre burning going up your nose”.
“You could feel the heat, the backdraft. You couldn’t see the fire because it was pitch black, you could feel the heat coming up the stairs,” he said.
Anthony Kavanagh, who was 19 at the time, gave evidence that when he noticed the fire behind the partitioned-off area of the nightclub, he saw a man standing beside the screen.
“I was saying to myself: ‘Please don’t open it.’ It opened and the flames shot right across the middle of the floor, that’s when all the screaming started. I was praying that he wouldn’t open it,” he said.
He told Ms McLoughlin-Burke that when he got to the exit, he and a couple of other men forced the doors open and they went “smack into a van” that was parked there. Mr Kavanagh also gave evidence of seeing a substance dropping from the ceiling once the fire started.
“It looked like acid dripping from the ceiling onto the chairs and people below, like drops of rain but like acid, you could see people, it was hitting them and obviously burning them,” he said.
He said that people were still dancing and there was still music playing when the fire was going on. He told Des Fahy KC, representing a number of the families of the victims, that the Stardust was packed that night and “you couldn’t swing a cat”.
“If he hadn’t opened that curtain, that fire would never have happened, that’s my opinion, there probably could have been another way to get in from behind,” he said.
The jury heard that Mr Kavanagh was in the army at the time and “did a bit of tug of war”, but it still took him and two other men about a minute to force the door open.
The inquest continues on Thursday in the Pillar Room of the Rotunda Hospital.
