As of this morning, the number of confirmed deaths has risen to 17, but the figure is expected to continue to rise, likely to exceed 100.
The fire began on the fourth floor of the apartment, and a refrigerator exploded in a room that then spread to the top in less than 15 minutes along the exterior of the apartment.
The building houses a total of 600 people and has only one escape passage.
According to the fire-fighting guidelines given by the building, many residents initially stayed indoors when the fire broke out.
But when the fire spread to all floors, the only stairway was smoking up like a chimney because it was burning from the ground floor.
This left many residents trapped in the middle of the fire, and the escape passage covered with smoke and eventually unable to escape, especially among those living in the upper ranks.
The building`s safety guidelines say: after the fire, if you are safe, stay indoors and close the doors and windows
One of the mothers, who dropped her child from the 10th floor, was picked up by a man. But she herself was doomed to doom at the end of the day.
Now, the focus on the fire has gradually shifted to an aluminum coating used outside the apartment building.
The analysis points out that the aluminum coating may be responsible for the rapid spread of the fire to the entire building.
The Grenfell building was built in 1974, with four households on each floor, four bedrooms per household, and one staircase for all.
Last year, the building was renovated and new windows and facades were replaced.
However, the coating material used in the exterior wall is likely to act as a "combustion aid".
History is always strikingly similar-in fact, a similar fire broke out in an apartment building in Australia as early as 2014.
A fire broke out in Lacrosse tower, an apartment on the Docklands,20 floor in Melbourne.
At 02:40, the building burst into flames at the end of an unextinguished balcony on the sixth floor of the apartment.
The fire quickly spread up the 13th floor in 11 minutes, and the scene of the fire was similar to the scene of the London apartment building fire.
At that time, 300 people living upstairs were evacuated in an emergency manner. Fortunately, as a result of the new building, upstairs rooms are equipped with automatic sprinkler fire extinguishers, so no one was killed.
But at least seven floors were badly damaged, with direct damage estimated at 2 million Australian dollars.
An investigation by the Melbourne Fire Department found that a flammable coating had been used outside the apartment building, which was responsible for the spread of the fire.
The material was imported from China at a low price but did not meet Australian safety standards and should not have been used in high-rise buildings.
Later, in a 2016 report, investigators found that more than a hundred high-rise buildings in Victoria could have used the unsafe flammable coating.
The Melbourne fire has also attracted the attention of authorities in the new state, which began to focus on building decoration materials used outside the building.
In September 2015, new state authorities released a report according to the law on disclosure of information. The report suggests that nearly 2500 buildings in the new state may be covered with similar coverings.
But this is only an estimate, and goverment did not further determine the exact number of buildings with such unsafe devices. And since the report was released two years ago, no concrete action has been taken to enhance public housing safety.
One developer said the aluminum coating is now becoming the focus of public attention as a result of the disastrous fire in London. But in fact, this kind of import material is quite common in Sydney.
"the Ministry of Planning and the Environment notes that preliminary analysis of the data indicates that there may be 1800 apartment buildings (using this material)." A report from the Fair Trade sector wrote.
"but this number should be used with extra care, and further analysis is needed to produce a more accurate estimate. In the initial consideration, about 1500 to 2500 buildings were used. "
And the report accurately predicted: "the problem with this aluminum composite plate is that when it is used on multi-storey buildings, it is possible that he will quickly spread the fire along the vertical direction of the building surface and exterior walls." This happens to be happening in this burning apartment building in London.
The new state`s shadow secretary, Yasmin Catley, said the goverment should immediately verify all buildings in the new state that may have used the non-standard material.
"the current goverment learned two years ago that about 2500 buildings may have used the same material, but their feedback on the data is disturbing."
"at this point in time, we have no idea which building is hiding a security risk, and the goverment has no oversight or intervention at all."
In 2015, the construction union wrote to the then governor of the new state, Mike Baird, asking for an emergency inspection of the state`s high-rise buildings, but did not receive a direct response.
Later, the 2015 goverment report noted that national laws and regulations needed to emphasize the issue, rather than a unilateral decision by the new state.
