14 • The Sunday Times Magazine
material’s surface — not how flammable
the whole product is. It meant that a highly
flammable core (such as the plastic inside
the ACM cladding) could be coated with
a thin fireproof surface (the ACM’s
aluminium facing) and pass as safe for tall
blocks. The ACM that burnt so disastrously
in the government test met Class 0, so was
legal to fit on high-rise homes.
“It sounds awful, but I think it just got
missed,” Brian Martin, the senior civil
servant at the centre of the crisis, told the
inquiry. He denied a cover-up.
The complex and confusing certification
regime was open to abuse. It allowed
Arconic, Kingspan and Celotex to present
the panels that later wrapped Grenfell Tower
as safe for tall blocks, even though they all
lacked valid tests. All three companies
exploited the Class 0 loophole. The first two
marketed their panels with results based on
different products. The third rigged a test.
Ministers only shut the Class 0 loophole
in December 2018, 18 months after the
Grenfell fire. By then it had been used to
clear flammable cladding systems for
many of the up to 366,000 dangerous flats
across Britain.
1.15AM: THE FIRE TAKES HOLD
For Samira Hamdan the first sign of trouble
that night was a call from her sister, Farah.
“She said there was a f-f-f ...” Samira stutters.
Even after five years she still cannot bring
herself to say the word “fire”.
Samira lived close to Grenfell and could
see one of Farah’s living room windows. It
was on the west face — opposite to where
the fire had started — and not yet ablaze,
though Samira could already see what
looked like flares shooting up the side of the
building. She had “this urge” of wanting to
check Farah’s other window on the north
side. With a cardigan over her pyjamas, she
circled the tower. She could “feel the heat
and hear the sizzling”. Floor by floor Samira
lifted her gaze, uncomprehending. Each
was “completely engulfed”.
Smoke was filling the flat inside, Farah
said in a 999 call at 1.30am. She and
Omar huddled with their three girls in theliving room, furthest from the fire. “Stay
in your flat unless it’s safe to leave,” the
operator told her.
With the fire clearly out of control, the
London Fire Brigade should have switched
the advice from “stay put” to “get out”
between 1.30am and 1.50am, the inquiry
found. It did not instruct residents to leave
until 2.47am, losing a crucial hour.
At 1.43am Farah called 999 again. The fire
had reached the floor below, she said. Omar
wanted them to leave but the black smoke
in the hallway was so thick that you could
not see your hand in front of your face.
While she was on this call three
firefighters passed their front door. David
Badillo, who led the crew, shone his torch
on their flat number, 175. But the firefighters
didn’t knock or shout. “It is just ... the
biggest, I can’t even articulate it, kind of kick
that takes the wind out of you,” Samira says
now. In tears, Badillo testified: “To the
family of the people in flat 175, I was looking
for another girl and I didn’t know there
was anyone in there.” Their radios were
not working high up. “We didn’t know
the whole building was on fire,” his fellow
firefighter Christopher Dorgu added.
They were looking for Jessica, 12, next
door at flat 176. Jessica’s big sister, who had
been out that night and returned home to
see the tower ablaze, had stopped Badillo
outside and told him she was up there
alone. But in fact Jessica wasn’t in their flat
any more. She had called her mother,
Adriana Ramirez, a housekeeper who had
briefly gone out to take medicine to a
friend’s sick child, from the stairs: “Mummy,
come get me. Come get me.” Then Jessica
got swept up in a group that went to the
top floor in a desperate attempt to survive.
Twenty-nine people sheltered on the top
floor. Only three survived. At 2.24am
Jessica’s 54-minute 999 call fell silent.
Twice more Samira spoke to her sister,
Farah, on the phone. All five members of
the Belkadi family were waiting for rescue,
with Leena strapped into Farah’s sling.
“Are the girls OK?” Samira asked.
“They’re a bit confused about why
they’re awake,” Farah replied. “We’re
playing a game where they’re just getting
ready for school.”T
he problems with Kingspan’s product
started in 2005, when it passed a
mock-wall fire test with K15 — its
flagship insulation that would be
installed behind some of the cladding
on Grenfell Tower. Acclaimed for its
eco credentials, K15 wraps hundreds
of other blocks. Such a test pass only
permitted the exact cladding system tested
— in that case, combined with rare cement
board cladding. However, Kingspan used it
to market K15 as generally safe for tall
blocks (over 18m). Then it changed the foam
formula to make it more efficient. A 2007
test with the new K15 caused a “ragingWITH A CARDIGAN
OVER HER PYJAMAS,
SAMIRA CIRCLED
THE TOWER. FLOOR
BY FLOOR SHE LIFTED
HER GAZE. EACH WAS
ENGULFED IN FLAMES
Flames leapt up and
down the tower as
the cladding melted.
Temperatures
exceeded 1,000C1.30am 2.34am 3.23am4.20am 5.16am➤ PA, GeTTY IMAGeS