3rd LD: Oakland fire leaves 36 dead, search for victims ends

Search and recovery operations ended Wednesday for victims of the deadly fire in Oakland, a city in northern California.

The death toll stood at 36, unchanged since Monday, as agents from the U.S. federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) were continuing their investigation into the source of the fire that broke out during a dance party Friday night in a cluttered warehouse.

"ATF is looking at every possible source of ignition," said ATF special agent Jill Snyder. "There is no timeline for the conclusion of the investigation. ATF experts will be on scene for possibly several more days examining physical evidence. The analysis of data and interviews may take several weeks."

"The digging part of the investigation is done, now is the analysis part," Snyder later told a press conference in the afternoon.

She cautioned about speculations in media reports, saying there was no evidence that a refrigerator was the origin of the fire, and there was no evidence it was caused by arson.

"By all accounts, the fire started on the first floor," Snyder told reporters on Wednesday morning. "There were two internal stairwells from the second floor that led to the first floor. Neither went to an exit. Smoke traveled up the stairwells, trapping the people on the second floor. There was rapid fire progression. Initial witness interviews have indicated the fire was well developed by the time the second floor occupants realized a fire was going on."

Her evaluation echoed what spokesman J.D. Nelson of Alameda County Sheriff's Office told a press conference on Tuesday, that autopsies had revealed the victims died of smoke inhalation and not burns.

Before winding down the search operations, which had involved about 300 firefighters since late Friday, a secondary search by recovery personnel and cadaver dogs was made and returned no additional victims.

While fire crews and heavy machinery were gone, few workers remained after midnight to remove debris from the two-story warehouse.

Also remained were shrines put up by mourners with flowers, candles, notes and others along sidewalks leading to the structure, named "Ghost Ship" by Derick Ion Almena, the man who turned the warehouse into the site of an arts collective, a residence for his family and reportedly some other tenants, and an underground party venue.

In the early hours of Wednesday, a young couple came up at one of the shrines. The woman wrote a few lines on a book there, about her prayers for the dead; and the man said he knew somebody among the victims through a friend.

At the time of the fire, an electronic music party was going on.

Oakland Fire Chief Teresa Deloach-Reed said on Saturday there was no sign of fire alarms and no evidence of a sprinkler system.

On Tuesday night, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf announced the release of the permit and complaint history from the past 30 years from the city's Planning and Building Department related to the warehouse.

Schaaf took additional steps Wednesday, including seeking help from the U.S. National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) to focus on the safety of buildings, the safety of events and improvements to complaint systems, and assembling a fire safety task force of national experts and local officials.

She outlined some areas where new regulations are being considered for the city, the third largest in the San Francisco Bay Area and the eighth largest in California, including smoke alarms and carbon monoxide monitors in commercial facilities, enhanced fire inspections, stronger emergency exit requirements, permitting of events, and monitoring of illegal events.

Faced with criticism that city employees had a part in the deadly fire as they did not do enough to enforce existing regulations, the mayor said that "we have to be as compassionate as we were throughout these past few days as we forge a path forward."

"I want to be clear we will not scape-goat city employees in the wake of this disaster; rather we will provide them (with) the guidance, clarity and support they need and deserve to do their jobs," the mayor said.

"There are lessons we can already take away about how to increase safety in our community," she added.

By Wednesday morning, the Alameda County Sheriff's Office Coroner's Bureau has identified 35 of the 36 fire victims, mostly northern Californian residents in their 20s and 30s, and had notified 32 families.

The death toll exceeded that of the Oakland Hills fire of October 1991, in which 25 people died. Endi