Fifty-four minutes past midnight, 14 June 2017, Behailu Kebede places a 999 call to report a fire in Flat 16 on the fourth floor of Grenfell Tower, a 24-storey, 67.3m block of flats in North Kensington, situated in the West London Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea.
Within the hour, flames had reached the roof of the building and spread horizontally, escalating into a major incident that officially claimed the lives of 72 people, left a community outraged and in mourning, a country stunned and an industry in a reputational crisis.
The cause of the fire is widely believed to have been the wiring in Kebede’s fridge-freezer but culpability for the scale of devastation has extended to the web of firms involved in the refurbishment of the tower between 2012 and 2016. The refit of the council-owned block fell short of safety standards, prompting questions about the culture of the construction industry and regulatory compliance.