Talk:Odessa Trade Union massacre/Fires

Tent Camp
forthcoming

Barricade
Explosive Start? There's some span of time after the tents were set ablaze that the barricade at the front door remained both manned by supposed "separatists" and free from fire. I haven't pieced together for sure when they finally clear out and get inside, nor when the mostly wooden barricade first starts burning. But the following might be the start of it, or an early moment anyway: u890zXcXV0E

That's from the 24:17 video uploaded by Andre Fomine (Oriental Review), at 4:32 into a video that starts, I think, around 7:35 (or 7:30-7:40). The area doesn't seem to be burning before this mysterious blast beyond any molotov cocktail. After, there is a column of flame. Other footage suggests the main part of the barricade the burned early was at the north corner, nearest to the camera here. The flash and boom are noticable, but the cameraman at his distance doesn't seem to notice it. A disctinct explosion like this doesn't seem to be widely reported. It does however line up oddly with what Andriy Parunbiy, Kiev's then-security chief and likely pogrom organizer, said in a May 21 interview:
 * When the explosion happened in the House of the Trade Unions, experts have shown that the substance that provoked it had been stored there a long time ago. The House of the Trade Unions was a kind of headquarters for the separatists, it was not controlled by the authorities, nor by the opposition. And the substance that provoked the blaze was brought there during this period of time [when the separatists controlled the building]. I’m not saying that this substance was inflamed on purpose. But when Molotov cocktails were thrown from the fourth floor at the participants of the Ukrainian rally, the substance inflamed.

This exterior blast can't explain the blaze(s) inside, but it's similar, and makes his point that explosive stuff was in areas the "separatists" controlled. --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:54, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Front Entrance
(fc)

Back Stairwell
At 13:40 in the 24:17 video, the cameraman is at the back (SW face) of the building. The exit here opens onto a courtyard, at the bottom of the central stairwell. Some people can be faintly seen in there, better in other videos, occasionally tossing things out. No one walks out the door for the whole video that I noticed. The few members of the mob back here are overseen by a moderate police force, including a commander with a bullhorn shouting at one side or another. The hecklers toss stones at the windows, but no one throws molotov cocktails here that I noticed, and there aren't any visible fires (the front was sporadically lit up before he walked back here). The cameraman laughs sometimes, like at 15:35 when a rock from above lands in the dirt. --Caustic Logic (talk) 23:33, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

This remains until 16:00 or so when he goes and films the police. At 16:34 check the audio - a stick hits 3 times. On third hit, a bunch of breaking glass is heard at once. That might be coincidence or not. 16:40 shots, pops, more glass, same to 16:54, with no clue shown as people argue. At 17:16 briefly, the camera pans far enough to see the courtyard looks smoky now. Each person there looks that way in the following seconds and says nothing, before the helmeted pointing guy decides to lead the way back to check out the brand new fire (17:39). Now everyone's shouting. At 17:52 (does that cop ask twice in English "who are you?") he finally looks up and just then the second floor breaks into major open flame. This and all floors above are already pouring massive black smoke. Sounds like gunshots, a boom at 18:01 that seems to put the flames out. They start again, weaker, on the left, and it keep poring smoke. However this happened, it offers a new explanation why no one from above anyway got down to that exit. With this and the torching of the front doors, both exits were blocked by fire, with this one being a little mysterious. --Caustic Logic (talk) 23:33, 3 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Inset video still from another video, found around - shows the police line (doesn't seem as solid from the cited video) and the second floor blaze some moments after the scene I described. The blaze seems brightest at the center here, as opposed to left-centered at the start. --Caustic Logic (talk) 12:23, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

Time: Considering the above, let's say 17:00 in the video is when the fire was started (it'll be close). If that video starts broadly between 7:30-7:40, being continuous, this would be 7:47 to 7:57. This alone puts it close enough to the 7:45 call about a fire inside, second floor, near an entrance, that maybe this is what they were describing (see leaked calls, and a translation I added for the entrance part, forthcoming). If so, the video starts at 7:28 or a hair earlier. Hm... pushes the tent fires back a couple minutes but it all fits fine. --Caustic Logic (talk) 23:33, 3 September 2014 (UTC) and Caustic Logic (talk) 12:23, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
 * "Entrance" explained - see leaked calls, 19:45:23 --Caustic Logic (talk) 22:58, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
 * The video "Trade Union House fire in Odessa full video" focuses solely on the front side, but does catch the back smoke briefly; at 2:36, during the pan-out, the column of black smoke from the back can be seen for the first time (see inset). The front door is already burning, here and before in a preceding edit - whether the back was smoking then too is unclear. This is a no-later-than time correlation. The same video, at 3:12 - several edits later and nearing full dark - shows this fire is seemingly extinguished and just putting off steam, as the front door blazes are just barely being put out. --Caustic Logic (talk) 09:58, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

More images:

At right, a photo run with the Telegraph's excellent report from Ronald Oliphant. By this time, after 8:09 PM fire crew arrival (see below). The wall is wet, and fire looks like it had gotten worse, then a bit betterbefore some climbing started. Below that, an RT photo, from a bit later yet after the still un-checked fire has burned away more of the window frame. --Caustic Logic (talk) 12:23, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Correction: looking closer, the frame's the same. Order unclear then, and likely the opposite of what I said. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:35, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Bottom image, from the 24:17 video we started with (at time-stamp 21:02), showing a good view of that door that never opens, the fire, and where the falling victims were just recovered from - except maybe on the right, where they also landed with some fire and partly beneath some gray, flat object. Not sure how to read that (see 19:03, a sad scene) This is earlier than the other two images, well before 8:09. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:35, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Important Features of this fire and this spot:


 * Most of the badly charred victims seen in a stairwell seem to be in this one, mainly and the worst-charred being on the second floor landing (I think...). But I don't think this we're looking at is what burned them. When it's filled in, see . I wish someone had though to keep a steady cam trained on that stairwell all night...


 * Enough apparent jumpers/tossed bodies (my theory for some) are seen on the 24:17 video alone, at the base of this stairwell, that it seems this is also the main place people first left the building, all of them with a fall. Might be the only place. Those allowed out n the front side, more visibly, climbed down ladders or scaffolding, or sometimes ropes. That doesn't happen back here.


 * And another point: this is where we see the possible in-situ chemical victims One is at the fifth-floor level, the other so far unclear - see Talk:Odessa Trade Union massacre/Chemicals --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:07, 4 September 2014 (UTC) and Caustic Logic (talk) 11:35, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Two important points less ... not sure why I decided that was the stairwell. In fact, the back one has concrete bannisters with stars, different windows and molding, and no bodies actually seen in it. See inset image: both views have the dark areas lightened to see detail, while leaving the glimpses outside intact. This is the same area, overllooking the Trade Union Hall's back (SW) courtyard. Therefore all bodies in a grand (main) stairwell, seen next to iron-bar and (stone rail?) bannisters are in the front main stairwell. That's all stairwell victims I've seen yet (8 on landings, 5 others on or near the stairwell) and also the two possible CW victims. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:29, 6 September 2014 (UTC)


 * If I may add to my back and forth ... that railing difference refers to the second floor landing only. The updated graphic shows this in relation to the below and the above - it's all one stairwell. There probably is no front one. This is where the charred bodies were seen - landings 3, 4, and 5.(more details coming as needed/possible) --Caustic Logic (talk) 15:02, 6 September 2014 (UTC)



Some explanation: the 2nd floor mix views: top is from this photo enhanced - bottom is from 0:10 in the Euromaidan PR's tactfully branded Russian Terrorists Burnt Alive In Trade Union Building Fire In Odessa Ukraine, May 2 2014. That's what cleared it up, consulting video finally. Filmed by some Syrian snuff film maker on speed, it seems like. Anyway, mapping it out from the end backwards, this starts on the 2nd floor (one body, boy? with metal stuck in his body?), up the stairs. 3rd floor landing, one burned man - third floor, one body - 4th floor landing, the famous scene of five bodies, partly dragged. Turning back, he joins his chaperone and security types - they turn left, walk down the long hall, turn left again, walk down two floors, and out into the back courtyard, north end. So this has to be the back (only) main stairwell. --Caustic Logic (talk) 01:06, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Other Interior Fires
* Northeast corner, 2nd floor, early: In the 24-minute video starting 7:35-7:40 from 3:12 forward one militant (masked) man can be seen out on the 2nd floor ledge (not there at 2:20 - dropped unseen from 3rd floor window suddenly opened, maybe trying to re-enter by a lower window, rather than keep climbing all the way down to the mob. He's eventually removed or escapes (unseen) but for several minutes remains pinned between windows, at the corner immediately above the unused north exit. Molotov cocktails hurled from below easily hit the 2nd floor window and ledge near him at 3:12, 3:42, and 5:49. The first few plus tossed stones cause the window to largely break apart, and the 5:49 toss finally makes it inside the room for bigger cheer than usual. The glow inside, seen briefly (from a video analysis, inset) is short-lived, with following frames darker. Perhaps someone with a fire extinguisher was trapped in that room. Generally, this shows it's difficult to light up the interior of the building with fire tossed from outside, even after the window glass is out of the way. --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:45, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Some clues say this video starts at 7:28. If so that brief internal fire would be around 7:34 PM. --Caustic Logic (talk) 22:58, 4 September 2014 (UTC) and Caustic Logic (talk) 11:35, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

The BBC, apparently thinking "the fire" was only on the tird floor, reported:
 * Third floor center (fc)
 * It remains unclear how the fire started on the third floor. Pictures clearly showed pro-Ukrainians throwing Molotov cocktails towards the floor. But Serhiy said he saw someone "on the third floor throw a Molotov cocktail through the closed window. However, the glass didn't break and a fire started inside".

This is a recurring charge in pro-Kiev narratives - that fire inside proves the "separatists" or "terrorists" burned themselves by stupid accident. The Telegraph's Oliphant reported:
 * Witnesses sympathetic to the pro-Maidan movement point out that video footage appears to show the fire beginning on the third floor, behind an intact window - and out of reach of the petrol bombs thrown by the crowd outside. Maybe, they say, a pro-Russian dropped a petrol bomb by accident.

Indeed - The compressed "full video" shows this, at 2:00. Some early cue has them zoom in just in time to see some flames emerge inside. To me, it seems to start with a faint flow, followed right after by a brighter burst. One explanation: two molotov cocktails towards the window, neither one aimed (very well) at it. The first might've hit the left wall low and off-frame, while the second one hit higher just right of the window, helping ignite the left fire further and creating the two patches of fire we can see. If so, that's some compound idiocy to allege. All because the people doing the tossing were inside? Someone needs to read the next section ... Besides, whoever tossed fire into that room, at the last frame before the view pans back out at 2:05, it seems someone else in the room managed to put this fire out quickly. One still frame shows the window suddenly black, and during the zoom out, and after, as far as I can see, it doesn't flare back up. That doesn't happen by itself - someone was in there, a target but with an extinguisher. So whoever targeted them, this fails to explain how "the fire" started.--Caustic Logic (talk) 11:35, 8 September 2014 (UTC)


 * SW corner stairwell, lower: Like the first one, this may be a short-lived fire, but we can see it starting anyway inside the building. In a scene described below, one of the Denis Cherkasov videos shows a molotov cocktail hurled down the stairwell at the same southwest entrance he and many others came in by. This is in the building's south wing, from the second floor to the landing, seen from the first floor. Some steps and the lower wall light up and burn for several seconds at least. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:35, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

The "full video" at 2:31 shows a rooftop defender near the southeast corner walking towards a new source of smoke, blowing north from somewhere to the south of there (see inset), apparently in the south wing. More glimpses at 3:12 and 3:40 (enhanced, inset in the inset). Smoke is rolling from that smaller wing (with only four floors). From a few brief, dim views, my best guess is several of the corner rooms at this end of the south wing (opposite end from the stairwell fire above) - floors 3 and/or 4 - are burning here. Smoke seems to be coming lighter from the south-facing windows (or even drifting from some other fire to the south/left), and much thicker from the two windows facing forward, and//or the southernmost windows on the main building - floors 3-5, unsure. That's too much sudden smoke pooling to be anything other than interior fire somewhere in there. --Caustic Logic (talk) 10:47, 8 September 2014 (UTC)
 * South Wing, Upper Floors

Inside Fires Mean What?
Patrick Oliphant, the Telegraph, May 3:
 * We will probably never know whose petrol bomb began the fire that eventually spread throughout the building, but this inferno ended up killing 32 people.
 * Witnesses sympathetic to the pro-Maidan movement point out that video footage appears to show the fire beginning on the third floor, behind an intact window - and out of reach of the petrol bombs thrown by the crowd outside. Maybe, they say, a pro-Russian dropped a petrol bomb by accident.
 * This is a possible explanation. But there is also no doubt that petrol bombs were being hurled in both directions.

This excellent report full of gathered details and allegations was a little naive about the inside-outside issue; it seemed clear enough that "both directions" seemed a good stand-in for "from both sides." Visually, that last is still true - the rooftop people thought to be "Pro-RussianDefenders do hurl fire down - and fire gunshots, and toss rocks - but there is reason to question who those really were, and even more to question who could be inside the hall, behind a third floor window. --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:07, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

As we've learned since then, there were at least two points where the pro-Kiev mob entered the building sometime probably not long after the tent camp was first torched around 7:30 PM (as explained here). Both southern exits were not blocked but turned into mob-secured access points, in before the fires, out as needed after ... The inset composite view from Channel 1 (Russia) shows one entry at which an apparent Pravi Sector member (red-and-black cap) strings barbed wire or razor wire, for unclear reasons. The other entry point is more widely-noted in the Dennis Cherkasov Videos. The south (or SW) entrance had its door jammed open with another door, and dozens to hundreds poured in here as well. Many people were implicated in this pograom... --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:07, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

In this Cherkasov videos, the mob can also be seen storming inside the halls, smashing down doors or trying, and dragging out one protesting woman. Another short video shows in his sequence shows fire starting inside a stairwell in the mob's midst (see inset). This is an odd sequence, widely taken as showing they started tis part of it, but it's a bit unclear and perhaps made to be. This and at least one other camera are working on this floor, whichever it is (second floor or higher), but might be banned from going to the next floor up, so we can't see who threw that molotov cocktail at these Maidanistas as they seemingly retreat. Maybe it was supposed to look like the hall's defenders finally pushing them back right before they torched themselves? I mean, who wouldn't try to chase invaders from their refuge by tossing fire at them, inside the flammable refuge? Well, everyone wouldn't want to, so I'm guessing this was staged, by the people then departing. The guy perhaps leading the group, with a motorcycle helmet and Ukrainian flag around his neck, has been identified (see this video) as a militant (unnamed) of some presence that day, from the early clashes to cataloguing the dead that night. He might have overseen the staging. of another fire inside the building. --Caustic Logic (talk) 22:38, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Correction: there are only a few stairs down - this is the same slightly-raised "ground floor" he started at. The action comes down from the second floor. The running kid, just one, supports that above here is not open-access. He hits the landing just as the m.c. tossed his way also hits. Right behind is a masked man with a club, who follows the kid to the right-hand doorway to make sure he's stopped snooping, Then he turns back the group otherwise headed by the militant leader who now has his own section as "Flagneck."--Caustic Logic (talk) 09:39, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Victims Burned Later?
Being actually burned to death, even in a burning building, is only so common. People will try to escape fire, and do well enough the smoke winds up doing them in instead. Usually the fire burns their dead bodies, if anything. But here in the Odessa massacre crime scene there are a few details suggesting these were deliberately and individually burned after death, likely in an attempt at coverup, and/or to sow the idea that, as Euromaidan PR's video puts it, the "Russian terrorists" were "burned alive." instead of, say, bludgeoned and shot to death before burning away the evidence. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:23, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Of all the bodies seen in or right at the stairwell (at least 11) only five are widely shown, and those are the badly charred ones. Correlating lots of photos and some video, it seems these are on the 4th floor landing (just above the 3rd floor), where seen mostly in one set of positions, the two shown dragged a little ways down the stairs - but were originally in a different arrangement (composite view below) - those two flat on the landing, the others how they are, with one victim originally hanging out the window, as if he died in the act of climbing out (later seen back inside, laid in the corner). --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:23, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

In both views, we can see at least two victims - those same ones shown in the top inset - display rigor mortis, and signs of being dragged by the arms after it had set in. That is, they were dragged here before they were dragged the second time. According to Wikipedia, rigor mortis onset is usually 2-6 hours after death (a bit faster in warm conditions - like a fire), usually reaching maximum stiffness after 12 hours and relaxing slowly thereafter. By this, anyone killed at around 8 PM would be rigid from 10 PM forward for more than a day. The arms being flexible enough to take this position suggests it wasn' too far in - probably before midnight - and the burning (contracts muscles) helped lock the position. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:23, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

The pile of junk barricade seen here on the right might make sense for building defenders to make, to keep the 4th floor lightly shielded. But it seems (from the limited views here) to block only one side, which would do no good. This could have been made by the scene-arrangers to tell a story (of stupid barricade-making?). In the one case, furthest to the right, it almost seems the debris was piled onto the victim's head (unclear).

The other victim, furthest down the stairs, has a burnt face and hands, and it seems separately had fire set to his mid-torso. It burned away his shirt and lap of his pants, ignited some belly fat, and then just bubbled up his abdomen for a while and fizzled out. When the fire punched a neat bullet-looking hole in his right chest is not so clear. Sometime before rigor mortis set in, and before he was burned. ... --Caustic Logic (talk) 12:59, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

The horribly charred body nearest the railing was perhaps carried here by two people, one holding each wrist. That one was apparently burned already, making the second burn a little too efficient; he (or she) stands out from the others who supposedly died right here from not-the-mob. In the original arrangement, the one hanging out the window raises questions. Supposedly he passed out just then from the chloroform and had the fire burn away his pants and melt the soles of his shoes. I imagine there is no visual match from the outside of a guy hanging out the window while a fire rage - perhaps it was too dark by then? How long after the above photos did he try to climb out? Or was he just put there and burned at a later time? --Caustic Logic (talk) 12:59, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

To note, most victims showing any burning tend to be to the head and upper body - some have heads only blackened by some specific flash-fire aimed right there (noses are sometimes burned away). However, those same often have hands even more burned, down to the bone (see here), as well as red-burned skin everywhere it was exposed (waistline, etc.) So this apparent clue might be related instead to something they were hit with when alive and still shielding their faces, and not related to post-morten torching. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:23, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Previous discussion of this concept, from May: File talk:Odessa burnt bodies.jpg - on a photo I stilla haven't found confirmation for - not certain it even belongs. --Caustic Logic (talk) 12:59, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Fire Response
fc

Leaked Calls
A later RT report of August 9 cites Bodelan somewhat skeptically speaking of "the fire brigades “that arrived at the site on time”" when recently obtained phone transcripts to emergency services show it took 13 minutes to travel the 300 meters from the station, on an order of 7:56 PM, following on the first reports of a fire (in the tent camp) at 7:31. Total time: 38 minutes, 25 of that waiting to even call the order. "Earlier, Bodelan repeatedly said that the first call his brigades received was at 7:45. However, the leaked document, which Bodelan allegedly signed himself, shows that it was 14 minutes earlier – at 7:31." In that time:
 * “A building at Kulikovo field is on fire, why aren’t you coming?" a caller asked at 7:48. “They are coming, coming,” the dispatcher responded. “Ok, are you waiting till it burns down?” the caller said. Another 12 calls were received within the next 10 minutes. “Hello, this building has been on fire for 15 minutes now. Is anyone coming or not?” a caller said.


 * “Hello? Are you coming?” a caller asked. “Yes, they are,” dispatcher said. “But we will burn down now,” said the caller. A note in brackets says the person calling was sobbing.

It does seem likely the crowd slowed them down further upon arrival, like se says, but the other delays before that are also not to be ignored. Perhaps he was told to let the tent camp burn, but started reacting when he learned the trade union hall was also burning and occupied. The RT report says he was sacked, then re-instated:
 * Shortly after the tragedy, the head of Odessa's emergency services department, Vladimir Bodelan, was dismissed from his position. Bodelan led the entire operation to combat the fire and was blamed for the unsatisfactory work of rescuers, who did not rush to the scene immediately after being called. ... On July 28, the Odessa City Court ruled to restore Vladimir Bodelan as the head of the state service for emergencies in the Odessa region.

One of the phone calls that didn't get heeded super quick was from UN Monitors, or so they say, in the June 16 report. HRMMU = Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine. They mave ways of monitoring and learning about things, in this case it seems pretty quickly.
 * 46. During the evening a fire broke out in the Trade Union Building. At 7.43 p.m., the HRMMU called the fire brigade, which has its base located 650 metres from the Trade Union Building. Reportedly, the fire brigade only arrived 40 minutes after receiving the first phone call about the fire. According to fire brigade officials, this was due to the fact that the police did not create a safe and secure perimeter allowing the fire brigade to easily access the Trade Union Building. The cause of the fire remains unclear at this stage. --Caustic Logic (talk) 14:16, 22 August 2014 (UTC)


 * Dumskaya report, Aug 8 (Ukrainian, as cited in and linked to in the RT piece) --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:45, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

From this, select calls Google translated with clarification by me, that add to what RT has already in English:

19:45:23

- Kulikovo field is burning

- Yes, there are burning tires, nothing threatened

- No, there was already thrown in the building and it starts to burn (missing noun?)

- On which floor?

- Second floor

- Second floor on fire?

- Yes, with (near?) entrance. (со входа was "with input," otherwise renders "from entrance" an image search suggests - but co means with, here maybe meaning near/above)

- I understand you.