The Great New Orleans Fire (1794) was a fire that destroyed 212 structures in New Orleans, Louisiana on December 8, 1794, in the area now known as the French Quarter from Burgundy to Chartres Street, almost to the riverfront buildings. The fire destroyed the royal jail. It spared the Mississippi River front buildings. Among the buildings spared was the Customs House, the tobacco warehouses, the Governor's Building, the Royal Hospital and the Ursulines Convent. Despite widespread fire damage, the St. Louis Cathedral was not destroyed but was dedicated just 2 weeks later, on December 23, 1794. The Spanish were to replace the wooden buildings with structures with courtyards, thick brick walls, arcades, and wrought iron balconies.
The Jesuit Church in Santiago, Chile was celebrating the last day of its annual "month of plenty". The priest hoping to make this year's service more grand than all other years decorated the entire church with many lights and decorations. There were so many lights that they had to start lighting them in the afternoon and didn't finish extinguishing them after the evening services until late in the night. On that night, December 8, 1863, there were 3,090 people in the churh when the last of the oil lamps was lit on the alter. Shortly after that, a jet of flame was seen at the foot of the statue of the Virgin Mary. The priest tried to outen it with his poncho, but it became soaked with oil from the lamps and ignited. People rushed for the doors. The fire darted up the garlands of artificial flowers to the roof and the immense cupola where the lamps suspended from the roof by strings dropped and exploded among the densely packed people below. The dry roof timbers ignited like tinder. Several heros rushed to the church and saved who they could through the doors. The roof eventually caved in and it was morning before the fire had burned itself out. Hundreds of people were found piled at the exits where they rushed in their panic. 2,500 people died in the fire.
The luxurious, ornate Ring Theater in Vienna, Austria burned on December 8, 1881. It was the second night of Jacques Offenbach?s opera Les Contes d?Hoffman. The balconies had filled with patrons. The wealthy class did not arrive to fill the first floor near the stage until closer to the start of the performance. At around 6:45 p.m., a stage hand used a long-arm igniter to light the row of gas lights above the stage. He accidentally also lit some prop clouds. The flames quickly spread to the curtain and the rest of the theater. The theater owners panicked and shut off the main gas line, cutting off light in the theater. Chaos ensued as the panicked crowd tried to exit. The balconies became clogged as the exits jammed with people. Fire brigades brought ladders, but they were too short to reach even the first balconies. People began to jump, killing themselves and crushing others below. Safety nets were brought for the people to jump in to. That saved as many as 100 people. The estimated death toll was somewhere between 620 and 850 people. The remainder of the structure was demolished and replaced with the Suhnhof building. This memorial was destroyed when Vienna was bombed during World War II. Today, a police station sits at the site.
1942
Seacliff Lunatic Asylum Fire - Seacliff, New Zealand
Fire broke out at the Seacliff Lunatic Asylum in Seacliff, New Zealand on December 8, 1942, at 9:45 p.m. The fire started in Ward 5, a two-story wooden structure added onto the original building, holding 39 female patients, who were locked into their rooms or into a 20-bed dormitory. The fire was noticed by a male attendant and the hospital firefighters tried to extinguish it with water from a near-by hydrant. However, the flames were too strong, and after an hour, the ward was reduced to ashes. Two women were saved from rooms that did not have locked shutters. All other patients in the ward are believed to have died from smoke inhalation. The fire was kept from spreading to other buildings.
About 300 people, most of them schoolchildren, died when fire engulfed the Friendship Hall Cinema movie theater in Karamay, Xinjiang Province, China on December 8, 1994. About 800 people, including 500 schoolchildren, were in the theater when the fire broke out. The children were from 15 local schools and were staging a cultural performance. An electrical short circuit started a small blaze in the ceiling during the performance, sending sparks cascading onto the stage. The stage curtains ignited, creating a ball of flame which engulfed the front rows of the audience. Within moments the entire hall was ablaze. More than 300 people died, most of them children, and at least 200 were injured. Most of the children who were killed were crushed in a panic to leave the building, while others died from smoke and fumes.
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