12 Killed in Fire at Tijuana Hotel for Transients

A blaze swept through a downtown transient hotel Sunday morning, claiming 12 lives and leaving four injured, authorities said.

Tijuana fire officials were still looking into the cause of the blaze Sunday night but police said it may have been an electrical short-circuit. The victims, mostly transients crammed into tiny rooms, died of smoke inhalation and burns, authorities said. At least 60 people were staying in the hotel at the time of the fire, it was estimated.

The blaze trapped many victims in the L-shaped, two-story hotel by blocking off the sole exit. There were no fire escapes, tenants said, and many of the units were without windows. People in units with windows escaped onto the roof of an adjoining building.

Some victims were found four to a room in units that measured less than 6 feet square. Others were trapped under a collapsing roof. A few residents who escaped described the back half of the hotel as a firetrap built of rotting wood and exposed wiring.

Survivors described tenants screaming for rescue, but many could not be helped.

“There was a lot of panic, yelling and desperation,” said resident Jose Silva Tapia, 27, who moved here recently from Mexico City to look for work, taking a $20-per-week room at the hotel. Tapia was one of 40 residents left homeless by the fire. Half were being temporarily sheltered at a city park.

The 40-unit hotel, in downtown Tijuana, four blocks from the touristy Avenida Revolucion, is one of many hostelries catering to Mexicans who have recently arrived in Tijuana and are looking for work or to cross the border into the United States.

Three of the dead were identified late Sunday by the Tijuana coroner’s office. They are Julio Cesar Serrano, 18, from the state of Morelia; Agustin Hernandez Perez, about 30, from Oaxaca, and his common-law wife, Elda Luz Cisneros, 31, from Sinaloa.

Several residents identified two more victims as Francisco Pimienta and his 12-year-old son Jose Guadalupe. The elder Pimienta had moved from Rosarito to be closer to his job as a mechanic.

Tijuana Fire Capt. Daniel Contreras said a list of victims and their ages will be released this morning.

Survivors said they awoke around 5 a.m. to screams. Smoke and intense flames hampered rescue efforts. Those injured were taken to the Red Cross and Tijuana General hospitals.

“I heard screams and I thought at first people were fighting,” said Carmen Lopez, a hotel resident. “But then the sparks were flying past my window and I told my husband, ‘No, that’s a fire,’ and we got up as fast we could. We made it in a matter of seconds. All our belongings were lost, except what I’m wearing.”

A jogging track at the park where the fire’s homeless survivors were being sheltered was the scene of the assassination earlier this month of the former federal attorney general for Baja California, Arturo Ochoa Palacios.