Two people suffered serious burns and six more people were treated after a fire broke out in a flat at Bodycomb Street in Castle Hill, Ebbsfleet, on Friday evening.
Firefighters were called to the street at 8.44pm on Friday, October 23, and emergency services remained at the scene for more than 10 hours. That attendance, measured from the 8.44pm call, ran past 6.44am into Saturday morning.
Residents were evacuated from the building after smoke and water affected other parts of the property, and a rest centre was set up for those forced to leave their homes.
Jim Dickson, the MP for Dartford, said on Facebook that multiple individuals were harmed and had been taken to hospital.
Bodycomb Street sits within Castle Hill, a residential area of Ebbsfleet in the borough of Dartford, close to Ebbsfleet International station. The area is made up largely of modern housing built as part of the Ebbsfleet Garden City development, and the street itself is lined with flats and family homes.
When a fire affects a block of flats, the effects often reach beyond the single property where the fire started. Smoke can travel through shared corridors and stairwells, while water used to fight the fire can damage neighbouring homes, which is why residents from other parts of a building are sometimes moved out even when their own flats are untouched.
Rest centres are set up by councils to give displaced residents somewhere safe to go while emergency services work. They typically provide shelter, food and drink, and a point of contact for information, and people are able to return home once the building is declared safe.
Kent Fire and Rescue Service covers Dartford and the surrounding area, working alongside ambulance crews and the police at serious incidents. At a fire involving casualties, paramedics treat people at the scene and take those who need further care to hospital, while fire crews make the building safe and check neighbouring properties.
No cause for the Bodycomb Street fire has been stated, and no further details about the condition of those treated, or about when evacuated residents were able to return, have been given. The number of people treated, and the fact that two of them suffered serious burns, are the only casualty details confirmed so far.
Dartford has also been the focus of a separate police appeal this weekend, after a 15-year-old girl from the town was reported missing and believed to have travelled towards London. Read more about the appeal for Ava Anderson, 15, from Dartford.
Castle Hill is one of the residential neighbourhoods within Ebbsfleet Garden City, a large housing development in Kent built around Ebbsfleet International station, which runs Eurostar services to the continent. The neighbourhoods there are made up of modern flats and houses, many of them only a few years old, and the area has grown quickly as new homes have been completed.
After a serious fire in a block of flats, fire investigators normally examine the scene once it is safe to do so, to establish where and how the fire started. Residents are usually allowed to return to their homes only after fire crews and building managers are satisfied the building is safe, and anyone whose flat is too damaged to live in is helped to find temporary accommodation.
People who suffer serious burns are usually treated at specialist hospital burns units, where teams deal with the immediate injury and the longer process of recovery. Hospitals do not routinely give updates on individual patients, and no such updates have been given in this case.
Anyone with information about the fire is asked to contact the emergency services through the usual channels.
