14/06/2017 London News

That's all for tonight. Continuing coverage on the BBC News channel

Here, on BBC One, it's time with any developments.

I'm a short distance from Grenfell Tower. You have seen how it looks

tonight. You have seen how it looked when the flames just took over the

building. Now, take a look at this. Take a look at this mountain of

clothes. This is the response from local people donating goods for the

people who've lost everything. You have these clothes here. You have

toiletries here, tooth brushings, food and water in this small space

alone. 100 volunteers working hard to make sure this gets to the people

who need it most quickly. Let's not forget. It's around about 24-hours

since that fire took hold, people in a neighbouring tower block saw what

happened in front of their eyes. So how they feeling tonight? Are they

scared, worried or anxious. Jim Wheble has been speaking to them.

It's not the view that muse ya ever expected, on the 13th floor,

You mean literally where those flames are now?

Where the flames are, if you move to the right,

Are you going make some more calls or go -

I'm going to make some calls and later on I'm going to go to bed

at the Rugby Centre to inquiry if they have any news.

Angela's further up, on the 19th floor.

Right in front of her, the neighbouring block,

As soon as I saw what was going on, I just couldn't, I couldn't bear it.

I turned on the news and just, sort of, let the news

But you could still hear the screams over the TV,

over the windows closed, over the doors closed.

Dennis is on the 10th floor, looking at a view that

Because I also remember, a couple months ago,

But it was different because that tower was one flat.

It's weird how here, how the whole...

The whole building just goes on fire.

So with this view from their balcony, how safe do they feel now?

Do you feel a bit unsafe now yourself?

Hopefully, everything - we can find a positive out of this

I don't want to think of the negatives.

As safe as you can be living on the 19th floor of a tower block

building when you've just watched another tower block building

People at this donations centre working at a furious rate, as you

can see. They are not working alone. Outside here you have people from

the sheikh Temple who have made food for the people volunteering who

might need to eat because they have been working hard all day. The

church have have their own election centre working with the ones here.

You have people of no religion who are involved because it's the right

thing to do. It's incredible to see. The people who need the help of the

volunteers are not just the people from Grenfell Tower, it's people in

surrounding properties who have had to evacuate their homes. Catherine

Carpenter has been speaking to them. A neighbour brings 88-year-old

Mary Dennis a chair. She's been awake since the early

hours when she fled her home, All of a sudden I heard my door -

bang, bang, bang. I did not get, I didn't get up,

but what happened when they bang it There was enough screaming,

children screaming, Another neighbour

offers food and water. Diego says he needs to keep

busy so he doesn't dwell Quite a few people we knew from

the tower apparently didn't make it. They saw people jumping

from the building. Overnight, St Clements Church

became his sanctuary. Here, and at every rescue centre,

donations have flooded in all day. the Al-Manaar Mosque counts many

Grenfell House residents Today, they were sorting

clothes and cooking. Food for those breaking

fast tonight or in need Other members of the community took

people into their homes, at least three families crammed

into this terrace The police evacuated us and my son,

he was having an asthma attack. If not, we'd have been

left out all night. Also taking in, four month

old Yesmin, her bed for the night a stranger's sofa while her mother

still waits for news You know what, it's not just second

hand clothes donated. People have bought new items of clothes, n

toiletries. This is extraordinary from Londoners, isn't it? The

response from the community in London has been overwhelming. We are

all shocked and horrified by what we have seen in the tragic events of

the tower. The generosity of the community has been overwhelming.

What struck me is that communities are working together? Absolutely.

Communities come from all over London and all over the country to

be able to donate and to contribute and support. Everyone you see here

is pretty much a volunteer. They are giving their services, giving their

hours, Middlesbroughle of the night almost they are working flat out.

Jasmine you worked flat out to make this happen? To be honest, it wasn't

something I was planning. I called the venue owner and said - look, I

know this space is vacant, would it be OK to use this space for

donations? It just spiralled into this. It's just been incredible.

Absolutely incredible. It's incredible to see as well. Thank you

so much for ling us be here tonight. It comes back to the fire, one of

the questions that a lot of local people are asking is how it spread

up the tower block so very quickly. One of the theories we are hearing a

lot of is that it had to do with the cladding around the building. That

is a theory which our reporter Gareth Furby has been looking more

into it. Arnold Tarling is a fire

safety expert and he's What we're testing

here is polyurethane, The reason he's doing

this is because he has a theory about why the fire spread

so rapidly at the Grenfell Tower. It's to do with a

material that may have The actual ridgied board insulation

that I believe is most likely to have been used is made from the same

material, polyurethane. I'm now setting fire

to this, and this is That is very, very

rapid and this is a typical material used

for insulating external buildings. Mr Tarling's test was put out

easily, but he thinks tonnes of similar materials could have

quickly burnt-out of control. The theory that I have is

that the building has been clad with a flammable insulation

material on the exterior. Of course there is no official

statement yet on the cause of the fire and the reason

for its rapid spread. But three years ago at a safety

conference, Arnold Tarling publicly warned that cladding high-rise

buildings could end in disaster and now he fears he may

have been proved right. It looks typical

of a cladding-related fire on the exterior

of the property. All the external cladding

has completely gone. Which is what you would

expect if you've got The principle of the design

of the cladding is that it's there to allow rain to effectively

get in and run down that cavity. The problem is that it will also

allow fire to spread up and what will happen is it

will actually create a path for the fire to spread and encourage

the fire to spread faster A spokesperson for the contractors

Rydon, who completed the refurbishment last year,

said it met all required building control fire regulation and health

and safety standards. The company Harley Facades Limited,

which was also involved in the refurbishment, said it would not be

appropriate to comment or others speculate on any aspect of the fire

or its causes in advance of the At this time the company said

it was not aware of any link between the fire and

the exterior cladding. Anyone concerned about family or

friends there is a special helpline that you can call to find out if

there is any information. Let me give you that. The Metropolitan

Police Casual Bureau the number is: 0800 0961, 233. The number is

available on our Facebook and BBC web page. Everyone is, woing really

hard to make things happen. I've never seen anything like what I'm

seeing in West London tonight. People are working hard to come

together, showing a really unified response to the tragedy that has

happened. That's it for now from me, but let's

find out what the weather's up In London we hit 27 degrees. The

next couple of days will be fresher weather wise. Warm enough in the

sunshine before temperatures start to sore up once again. 30 Celsius

potentially Sunday. Tonight a very mild and muggy night. Temperatures

in the centre town no lower than 17 or 18 degrees. Dry night with partly

clear skies. Sunny start to Thursday with light wind around it will be

warmest during the latter stages of the morning, around lunchtime. Cloud

will push across threatening light showers. Most of the time will be

dry. Temperatures may peak at 24, 25 degrees. Early afternoon before

dropping off a little bit as fresher air pushes in and the westerly wind

kicks in. Friday we will do it again as far as temperatures are concerned

with bluer skies and lighter winds into the weekend. It will get

hotter. into the weekend. It will get

hotter. Ben has more Tomorrow, will be a different

feeling day due to this cold front feeling day due to this cold front

pushing in from the west and behind feeling day due to this cold front

that we will see at least for a time a return to fresher conditions. The

that we will see at least for a time front