5 Women Die In Limo Fire On SF Bridge!

Jeez Louise. Roulette Man opens his mouth and folks want to jump all over him. I don't think my disagreeing with him over the culpability of the driver means I'm calling him out.

Carry on.

Actually, I'm relying on the expertise of the 33 year fireman who wrote about it a few posts back. His explanation sound quite credible, while your assumption about the driver sounds like - well let's just say it sounds like you.

Actually one of the survivor's and one witness said the driver was useless. I'll say again, you have less common sense than a child and I don't think you are capable of logical thinking skills. I'm not claiming the driver set the fire. I'm claiming the driver was probably negligent or doing something that he wasn't supposed to do and is using an excuse that makes no senes.

Limo Fire Survivor Says Driver 'Didn't Do Anything' to Help

One of the women who survived a weekend limousine fire, killing a bride and four of her friends celebrating her wedding, says the driver did too little to save her friends, which he has denied.

"When he get out from that car, he just opened the door, that's all he did," Nelia Arellano, 36, told ABC News affiliate KGO-TV. "I even ask the driver, 'Open the door, open the door.' He didn't do anything.

"I even ask him, 'Help me, help me,' because I bring out my head from that compartment and say, 'Help me,' so I could squeeze myself over there and slide myself," she said Monday.

But limousine driver Orville Brown has a different story, saying that he did everything he could to save his passengers.

"I don't know what we could have done differently to save them," Brown said in an interview.

READ MORE: Grim Task of Identifying 5 Limo Fire Victims

Brown, 46, was driving a 1999 Lincoln Town Car limousine Saturday night when it burst into flames as it crossed the San Mateo-Hayward Bridge near San Francisco.

Arellano, one of the four surviving passengers, says she tapped on the partition to alert Brown to the inferno building in the back of the limo where she and eight other women were celebrating the recent nuptials of Neriza Fojas, who died in the blaze.

"I said, 'There's already a fire. Stop the car. Stop the car,'" Arellano, 36, told KGO.

Brown told the San Francisco Chronicle he believed the tapping on the partition was the women asking to smoke.

When he finally pulled over, he helped pull Arellano and the other survivors through the limo's 3 foot by 1 ½-foot partition and out the front door, according to The Associated Press.

Three good Samaritans, including an off-duty California Highway Patrol sergeant, also jumped in to assist.

"Two cars helped us," Arellano recalled. "I said, 'I need to go back and save them,' but the man said, 'No, you cannot go back anymore.'"

Brown, who escaped unharmed, said one of the survivors did go back to the limo and opened a door, possibly inflaming the fire by providing oxygen.

"When they opened the door, that let the fire get oxygen, that oxygenated the fire, it allowed oxygen to get to the fire and that fire spread so fast," Brown told KGO, noting there was no explosion or boom along with the fire.

Brown has said in interviews he believes the cause of the fire was electrical, noting it, "could have been smoldering for days." Authorities have said it is too soon to pinpoint the cause.

The victims' bodies were found huddled near the partition separating the driver's section of the car and the rear passenger area, suggesting they were trying to escape the fire, according to San Mateo County Coroner Robert Foucrault.

Fojas, 31, and a second dead passenger, Michelle Estrera, were both nurses at Community Regional Medical Center in Fresno, Calif.

Fojas was recently married in the United States and was planning a second ceremony in the Philippines next month. Fojas and her friends were on their way to the Crowne Plaza Hotel for her bridal shower, where her husband was waiting, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Another dead passenger, identified by KGO as Jenny Balon, was a 39-year-old mother of two children.

Her husband, John Balon, says he was told by Arellano that just prior to the fire, smoke poured in from the back of the limo cabin.

"Jenny was all the way back so she wasn't able to pull her out before the car was engulfed in flames," he told KGO.

The three survivors hospitalized were identified as Jasmine Desguia, 34, of San Jose; Mary Guardiano, 42, of Alameda; and Amalia Loyola, 48, of San Leandro. Arellano Oakland, was treated and released.

California Highway Patrol Capt. Mike Maskarich said the limousine was over capacity Saturday night.

"This particular vehicle was licensed to carry eight or fewer passengers. As we know, there were nine people in this vehicle," he said.

The California Highway Patrol is expected to officially release the names of all five victims involved in the limousine fire tragedy today.

https://gma.yahoo.com/limo-fire-survivor-says-driver-didnt-anything-help-161909741--abc-news-topstories.html

When something appears to be unusual, people will wonder what happened and why it happened. They may postulate on the what and why without actual knowledge. I recall Chilcoot suggesting the explosion in West, TX to be the result of a lack of government regulations within the state of Texas without having any direct information as to what caused the explosion. To this day, the only thing that is known about the explosion is there was a fire before the explosion occurred. I would suggest that Chilcoot not be too quick to criticize others who may postulate without knowing all of the facts.

My criticism never depended on what caused the explosion. I don't know what caused it, couldn't even hazard a guess.

My criticism was based solely on that community's inability to locate fertilizer plants and residences far enough away from one another so that an explosion at the plant would not obliterate people in the residences. For whatever reason, the system in West, Texas failed, magnifying the impact of the explosion.

I don't mind if you can't understand that point, but please don't mischaracterize it to others.

Now THIS is the LVA I used to know.

Arrogant ignorance is your forte.

I'm sorry, where's the bit where I said the explosion was "the result of a lack of government regulations", as you claim? See how I never said that? Yes? No?

Probably no. Ah well.

Maybe repetition works with you. Here's what I said, but with different words you may be better at understanding.

Fertilizer plants should not be sited near residential neighborhoods and nursing homes.

We should not put people's homes near facilities prone to catastrophic explosions, particularly when we are not keen on regulating those facilities, and where we have distorted the tort system to such a degree that the facilies' owners don't fear being held to account for the dangers they impose.

Texas has earned its reputation.

Etc....

"particularly when we are not keen on regulating those facilities"

You clearly place blame on a lack of governemt regulations.