A 60-year-old man died after leaping from a 4th-floor window to escape a fire that had broken out in a home for the elderly.

The fire alarms in the said building, Residencia de San Francisco in Loja, went off just after 22.00h because of a mattress fire in the victim’s room.

We don’t know yet whether the mattress caught on fire through design or whether it was by accident.

The staff began rousing the residents whilst fire personnel moved everybody down to the ground floor. Meanwhile, on the 4th floor, the fire personnel checked if the fire had broken out  of the confines of the room, which it hadn’t.

The press release does not mention at what point the man had jumped from the window to escape flames; whether it was prior to the arrival of the fire service or just before they managed to access the room.

Two of the staff required medical attention, suffering from smoke inhalation. The rest of the staff and residents all resulted uninjured, except for the deceased.

The Residencia San Francisco, which is in the barrio of Loja of that same name, is the longest operating one in the municipality.

Provisionally, negligence on the part of the residency’s staff has been ruled out. However, the Guardia Civil are carrying out an investigation together with experts from the Municipal Fire Department.

(News: Loja, Poniente de Granada, Andalucia)