General   (General discussion, talk about anything.)

From the official report,

Despite praising the bravery and commitment to duty shown by individual firefighters, Sir Martin said that this could not “mask or excuse the deficiencies in the command and conduct of operations”.

An analysis of the events on the night of the fire revealed a number of “significant systemic and operational failings” on the side of the LFB. These include the amount of time it took to override the ‘stay put’ policy. The report concludes that a decision to organise an evacuation could and should have been made between 1.30am and 1.50am and would likely have meant fewer fatalities. The report adds that the best part of an hour was lost before stay put advice was revoked.

According to Sir Martin, the early incident commanders failed to effectively seize control of the situation.

Meanwhile, those who were responsible for managing information from 999 calls failed to establish a clear system for receiving, recording and transmitting information, meaning much was left to the initiative and improvised methods of individual officers. The report brands this a “deplorable state of affairs”.

There are many reasons listed for the failures in communications, including problems with defective physical or electronic communication systems, which “significantly limited the efficiency of search and rescue operations inside the tower”.