The mayor of Milan says the cladding melted in the fire of the tower, as in the Grenfell in London

MILAN, August 30 (Reuters) – The mayor of the Italian financial capital, Milan, asked for answers on Monday about why a fire was able to tear an apartment block and melt its lining, compared to the fire of the Grenfell Tower in London which killed 71 people four years ago.

Firefighters said everyone managed to escape the 18-story building south of Milan, which was destroyed by flames that erupted Sunday afternoon. Among the residents in the tall building was rapper Mahmood, winner of the 2019 San Remo music festival with his international hit ‘Soldi’.

According to witnesses, the fire, which started on the 15th floor, quickly jumped through the exterior cladding of the building. The video of the flame showed panels falling apart from the building in liquefied lumps.

“The tower was built just over ten years ago and it is unacceptable that such a modern building has proven to be totally vulnerable,” Mayor Beppe Sala wrote on Facebook.

“What became clear from the start was that the building’s outer casing caught fire too quickly, so it’s reminiscent of the fire at London’s Grenfell Tower a few years ago.”

The deaths in the Grenfell Tower fire in Britain were blamed on exterior cladding panels of flammable material. Owners of flats in similar buildings across Britain have been forced to remove these panels at an estimated cost of billions of dollars, forcing many residents to suffer financial hardship.

Report by Crispian Balmer Edited by Peter Graff

Our standards: the principles of trust of Thomson Reuters.