1974 — June 30, Fire of incendiary origin, Gulliver’s Discotheque, Port Chester, NY — 24

–24 Lathrop. “Discotheque Fire – Twenty-Four Dead.” Fire Journal, Vol. 68, No. 6, Nov 1974.
–24 National Fire Protection Assoc. “Multiple-Death Fires, 1974.” V69, N4, July 1975, p. 11.
–24 National Fire Sprinkler Association. F.Y.I. 1999, 7.
–24 New York Times. “25 Years Later, Disco Fire Haunts Its Survivors, July 1, 1999.

Narrative Information

Lathrop/NFPA: “On June 30, 1974, a fire of incendiary origin killed 24 people in a young adults’ night club in Port Chester, New York. The fire started in an adjacent occupancy and the smoke suddenly entered the dimly-lit disco¬theque. The band leader requested the patrons to leave in an orderly fashion, and more than 400 people evacuated the building. Fire fighters rescued more than 30 people; 24 victims were trapped and killed by the heavy smoke conditions.

“The night club, called Gulliver’s, was part of a small shopping center on the Connecticut-New York border that also housed a bowling alley, a men’s clothing store, and a barber shop.

“The one-story building was constructed of concrete- block walls, with wood flooring. The built-up roof was on a plywood deck on wood joists on steel beams sup¬ported by metal posts. The interior partitions were of wood-frame construction, except as otherwise noted in Figure I. All parts of the building except that occu¬pied by the bowling alley had a full basement. The bowling alley had a crawl space below.

“The first floor of Gulliver’s had an entry foyer, a lobby, bar, rest rooms, kitchen, and dining room. Be¬neath this area, in the basement, were storage areas, offices, dressing rooms, and a service bar. The dance- floor level was approximately five feet lower than the first-floor level and had a crawl space below that was used as a storage area. The only ways off the dance floor were a pair of adjacent open stairs, one to the basement and the other to the first-floor level.

“In Gulliver’s, the floors were plywood covered with carpet with foam rubber backing. The wall covering in the dining room, lobby, and foyer was a plastic imitation barn board panel glued to either gypsum or existing plywood paneling. The walls on the dance- floor level had some of the plastic paneling, but con¬sisted for the most part of plywood panels over…gypsum board. The ceilings throughout Gulliver’s were suspended panels in metal frames.

“The area of origin was in a basement section under the men’s shop, which the bowling alley rented. A stairway in the bowling alley went down to a doorway in the concrete block wall that separated the bowling alleys from the rest of the shopping center. The door¬way gave direct access to the rented basement area. That area contained a children’s playroom and storage space, which were separated from each other by wood¬panel-on-wood-stud partitions that did not extend to the suspended ceiling. The playroom had wall-to-wall indoor-outdoor carpeting that was placed over an ex¬isting rug in some areas and over tile in others. This basement area contained a considerable amount of combustible material. The wall that separated the playroom and storage area from the dance-floor level was constructed in such a way that a large void existed inside the wall… Separation of this area from the rest of the basement was provided by an 8-inch cement-block wall; however, this wall extended only to the bottom of the joists.
“On Saturday evening, June 29, Gulliver’s was occupied by an estimated 500 people. This estimate varies according to witnesses; however, based on descriptions of the crowd, conditions in the discotheque, and the size of the area available, the estimated figure seems reasonable. At approximately 1:00 am, people in the service bar area in the basement at the foot of the stairs to the dance floor noted smoke coming in from another area of the building ( the storage area occu¬pied by the howling alley ). Reportedly, someone went to call the Fire Department, while another person notified the band leader, who asked the patrons to leave. An orderly evacuation reportedly began. How¬ever, within a minute, heavy smoke started to come up the stairs from the service bar area and the al¬ready dimly-lit discotheque blacked out. As the smoke poured up the stairway from the basement, occupants of the dance floor tried to leave by the adjacent stairs to the first floor, the only way out. Even though the “up” stairs were 5½ feet wide, the crowd could not escape fast enough and people started to lose con¬sciousness near the stairs.
“Shortly after 1:00 am, the Greenwich, Connecticut Fire Department received what sounded like a prank phone call reporting smoke around Gulliver’s. However, they dispatched a full first-alarm assignment of two engines, one truck, and one squad. The units arrived within two minutes and notified Port Chester, New York, of a working fire on the State line. Calls were put out for ambulances and extra equipment. The Fire Departments were faced with an extremely difficult situation. People were lying in the parking lot, and the building was heavily charged with smoke, with people inside. Wearing self-contained breathing apparatus, fire fighters from both Departments entered the building and rescued an estimated thirty people, mostly from the area of the stairs leading from the dance floor. The heat then intensified considerably and they were forced to retreat.
“After the fire was extinguished, the remaining bodies were removed from the dance-floor area; twenty-four people had died.” (Lathrop, James K. “Discotheque Fire – Twenty-Four Dead.” Fire Journal, Vol. 68, No. 6, Nov 1974, National Fire Protection Association.)

NFPA: “Discotheque, Port Chester, New York. On June 30, 1974, a fire of incendiary origin killed 24 people in a young adults’ night club. The fire started in an adjacent occupancy and the smoke suddenly entered the dimly lit discotheque. The band leader requested the patrons to leave in an orderly fashion, and more than 400 people evacuated the building. Fire fighters rescued more than 30 people; 24 victims were trapped and killed by the heavy smoke conditions.” (National Fire Protection Assoc. “Multiple-Death Fires, 1974.” V69, N4, July 1975, p. 11.)

NYT: “Judy Grella, now Judy Acosta, 43, was one of at least 200 young people crowded into Gulliver’s, a sprawling bar, restaurant and discotheque, after midnight on June 30, 1974…. Just before 1 in the morning , George Chase, a singer performing with his band, Creation, announced that there was a small fire next door and urged everyone to leave calmly. For the most part the dancers did, funneling through a four-foot wide staircase of six steps that took them up to the dining area of the split-level and out the front door. But within seconds, a rush of acrid smoke engulfed the dance floor and blinded more than 100 stragglers, leaving them gasping for air and trapped behind a staircase clogged with fallen bodies.

“Twenty-four young men and women were killed by the smoke and fire, their cars sitting in the parking lot, their parents at home waiting for them to return….

“The fire at Gulliver’s was the deadliest dance club fire in the United States in more than a generation — the Coconut Grove fire in Boston in 1942 had killed 491 and the Happy Land fire in the Bronx in 1990 was to kill 87 — and it called attention to the dangers of herding young people into windowless underground rooms without smoke alarms, sprinklers, fire-resistant walls or limits on occupancy.

“In the aftermath, some municipalities put safeguards against fires into effect, but it was not until 1980, when a blaze at Stouffer’s Inn in Westchester killed 26 — that lawmakers in Albany overcame landlord resistance and approved tougher fire safety legislation.

“The authorities arrested a 22-year-old Greenwich laborer, Peter Leonard, and charged him with setting the fire to conceal his burglary of cigarette machines in the bowling alley behind Gulliver’s. Two guilty verdicts for murder were overturned because Mr. Leonard’s confession was first found to be coerced and then found to have been made without the presence of his lawyer. In 1986, though, he pleaded guilty to reckless manslaughter and was sentenced to the time he had already served — about 12 years….” (NYT. “25 Years Later…”, July 1, 1999.)

Sources

Lathrop, James K. “Discotheque Fire – Twenty-Four Dead.” Fire Journal, Vol. 68, No. 6, Nov 1974, National Fire Protection Association.

National Fire Protection Association. “Multiple-Death Fires, 1974.” Vol. 69, No. 4, July 1975, pp. 9-11.

National Fire Sprinkler Association, Inc. F.Y.I. – Fire Sprinkler Facts. Patterson, NY: NFSA, November 1999, 8 pages. Accessed at: http://www.firemarshals.org/data/File/docs/College%20Dorm/Administrators/F1%20-%20FIRE%20SPRINKLER%20FACTS.pdf

New York Times. “25 Years Later, Disco Fire Haunts Its Survivors, July 1, 1999. Accessed at: http://www.nytimes.com/1999/07/01/nyregion/25-years-later-disco-fire-haunts-its-survivors.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss