Doctors at King Abdul Aziz Hospital declared teacher Souzan Al-Khaledi, 32, brain dead. She was in the hospital’s intensive care unit.
The other two victims were teachers Reem Al-Nahari and Ghadeer Katoua. Al-Khaledi sustained severe injuries after she jumped out of the window to escape from fire. Her brain stopped working as a result of recurrent blood clots.
Al-Khaledi was taken to King Abdul Aziz Hospital, located in southern Jeddah, on a Red Crescent helicopter.
Azhari Al-Khaledi, the teacher’s brother, accused Jeddah’s Health Department of not transferring his sister to a specialist hospital inside or outside the Kingdom for better treatment.
Meanwhile, Maj. Gen. Adel Al-Zamzami, director general of the Civil Defense Department in the Makkah province, on Sunday rejected claims that his fire-fighting units arrived late at the school to put out the fire. “Our operations room received the information about the fire from a school teacher at 12:57 p.m. on Saturday,” Al-Zamzami said in a statement.
Referring to the teacher who claimed on a radio station that she had called 999 to report the fire, the statement said it was not the number for the Civil Defense.
“Before we received information from the operations room looking after security patrols, we had received so many other calls and by that time some of our fire-fighting units were already at the school premises,” the statement said.
Al-Zamzami emphasized that Civil Defense officers have been working round the clock to save the people from accidents, fulfilling the pledge they made in front the country’s rulers. “The claim that our officers arrived late at the fire site is totally untrue,” he added.
He said an automatic system at the Civil Defense records all activities from the time information was received about a fire until it was contained. “Nobody can make tamper with this system.”
He said the department had sent 23 units from different parts of Jeddah to put out the fire and carry out rescue operations. “We had also sent three helicopters and two mobile ladders to support rescue operations,” he added.
Al-Zamzami said his department had issued several alerts after receiving information about the fire so other emergency services could respond. As a result, the health department sent a number of medical teams and ambulances. It also declared a state of emergency for all hospitals and health centers in the city. The Red Crescent Authority sent more than 20 ambulances and two air ambulances in addition to medical teams.
“All this happened as a result of the Civil Defense action soon after receiving the initial report,” the general said.
He said it was quite natural that some people would try to put out the fire and rescue victims before the Civil Defense arrived.
He said the fire occurred in the underground floor of the school building and had not reached the upper floors or nearby facilities. This was the reason the department used only one team to quell the fire, while eight fire-fighting teams were on standby outside.
“People often forget an important fact that it is not the fire but its after effects that are often more dangerous and harmful as it contains poisonous gases. Those who inhale such gases may fall unconscious or die,” he added.
