Local residents have feared for some time that things would go wrong in the building on Lichtstraat in Eindhoven, which burned down on Saturday. That’s what Marco Karssemakers says. He is the VVE chairman of the De Graaf apartment complex, right next to that building. According to him, homeless people lived in the former Philips Lighting Application Center and regularly lit fires. “To get warm or make food.” Whether this caused Saturday’s devastating fire is being investigated.
“We were sitting on our balcony when the fire broke out, six people were visiting us”, Marco looks back. “At one point we smelled a certain burning smell. At first we thought that people would be barbecuing. But at a certain point that smell became more annoying. Then we went to look and saw a lot of smoke.”
“We saw the flames coming out of the building.”
At that point, they decided to go outside to see what exactly was going on. “Then it turned out to be the LAC, which was on fire. There was an incredibly intense smoke development. Then it went quickly. At one point we saw the flames coming out of the building and we saw the fire brigade intervene.”
Several people then decided to leave the apartment complex just to be on the safe side. “A logical reaction”, says Marco. “An alarm went off here too, and you never know.”
“We have requested several times to close this building.”
According to the VVE chairman of the De Graaf complex, the LAC building had been empty for a long time. “It was very often used to spend the night by people who do not have a roof over their heads. That is quite a problem in the Netherlands, also here in Eindhoven. We have therefore requested that the building be closed several times. to close it. The windows are ‘fenced off’ and if something was opened, that opening was quickly closed again. Concrete blocks were put in front so that people could no longer enter, but then people climbed on those blocks in order to enter a floor higher.”
Marco does not know exactly how many people stayed in the building. He puts it at ‘a lot of homeless people’. “We know a number of them by sight, we see them every day. But I don’t dare to put a number on them, really not. I just hope there were no people inside when that fire broke out on Saturday. That would be the worst, if there were victims would be…”
“You don’t open your window here on the ground floor.”
Several residents of the apartment complex have reported that they have been experiencing nuisance from the homeless in their neighborhood for a long time. They caused a mess at the apartment complex and some even slept on residents’ balconies. ‘
Marco knows the stories. “A woman lives on the ground floor, who locks everything at night. I live on the fourth floor myself, I just have my window open. You don’t do that here on the ground floor. Those balconies are accessible from the public space. Those residents regularly wake up in the morning with people sleeping on their balconies.”
Last year, residents already raised this situation. “There are just a lot of people who are looking for a place in the Netherlands that we can’t give them. They are seriously affected by this. There are many people who stay here at night. This is the heart of Eindhoven, it is busy here and there are many people who look for a place to sleep here at night.”
This is what the fire in the center of Eindhoven looked like.
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Burnt down building was a well-known place for the homeless: ‘Hope we don’t miss anyone’
This is what the mega fire in the center of Eindhoven looked like