Mesa Redonda fire

2001 disaster in Lima, Peru

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Spanish. (December 2023) Click [show] for important translation instructions.

View a machine-translated version of the Spanish article.
Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia.
Consider adding a topic to this template: there are already 5,024 articles in the main category, and specifying|topic= will aid in categorization.
Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article.
You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Spanish Wikipedia article at [[:es:Incendio de Mesa Redonda de 2001]]; see its history for attribution.
You may also add the template {{Translated|es|Incendio de Mesa Redonda de 2001}} to the talk page.
For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

Mesa Redonda fire

Date	29 December 2001
Time	7:30 PM
Location	Mesa Redonda, Lima
Cause	Pyrotechnics flare, negligence
Deaths	291
Non-fatal injuries	134

The Mesa Redonda fire occurred on Saturday, 29 December 2001 in Lima, Peru. The disaster killed at least 291^[1] people and injured at least another 134.^[2] It is currently the worst firework-related fire in history in terms of deaths.

Origin

In 2001, the Mesa Redonda shopping center, located in Central Lima, consisted largely of wood and adobe houses lining narrow streets. In December, fireworks merchants were known to sell their goods for holiday celebrations.^[3] Wary of the danger, the municipal government of Lima declared the area an "emergency zone."^[3]

The fire began at about 7:30 PM on the night of 29 December when a fireworks display created a chain reaction, setting off the fireworks of other nearby vendors.^[4] A spark from the demonstration had landed on a stockpile of fireworks, creating the initial explosion.^[5] The aftermath created a "wall of fire" that spread for four blocks and raged for several hours.^[4]

References

^ Gonzales, David (2002-01-06). "Lima Street Vendors Caught Between Police and Poverty". The New York Times. Retrieved 12 October 2013.
^ "Fireworks killed 282 people in Peru". BBC News. 31 December 2001. Retrieved 29 September 2013.
^ ^a ^b "Peru's fire: death foretold". The Economist. 3 January 2002. Retrieved 12 October 2013.
^ ^a ^b Ryan, Missy (30 December 2001). "Over 200 die in Peru fireworks blaze". The Guardian. Retrieved 12 October 2013.
^ Stonaker, Mary Elizabeth (2008). Management of Dead Bodies in Disaster Situations. DIANE Publishing. p. 153. ISBN 9781437900637.