ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey has arrested 11 people in an investigation into a fire that killed 79 people and injured dozens more at a ski resort in the Bolu mountains, the country’s defense minister said on Wednesday. Justice, Yilmaz Tunc.
Among those arrested were a deputy mayor of the northwestern Bolu province, the municipality’s fire chief, the hotel’s owner and manager, Tunc said on X.
Several funerals were held Wednesday for the victims of Tuesday’s fire, including many children. The fire forced panicked hotel guests to jump out of windows in the middle of the night.
“Our hearts and souls are suffering,” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at the funeral of eight victims from the same family in Bolu, western Turkey.
“I pray for patience for the entire family and for our nation.”
The bodies of 45 victims have been released to their families and forensic DNA tests are underway to identify the others, the government said.
The Minister of the Interior announced on Tuesday that 76 people had been killed in the fire, but the Bolu prosecutor’s office updated the death toll to 79 deaths on Wednesday evening following forensic DNA analyses.
The fire occurred at the Grand Kartal Hotel in the Kartalkaya ski resort, a 12-story hotel that accommodated 238 registered guests. It was consumed by flames after the fire broke out on the restaurant’s floor around 3:30 a.m. (00:30 GMT).
Some survivors reported hearing no fire alarms during the incident and guests reported having to navigate smoke-filled hallways in complete darkness.
The hotel pledged to fully cooperate with the investigation and said it was “deeply saddened by these losses.”
At a funeral in Ankara, a family’s coffins were lined up in front of the Ahmet Hamdi Akseki Central Mosque.
The parents, a doctor and a teacher, had gone to Kartalkaya with their three children to ski during the school holidays, according to a Reuters witness at the funeral.
At least 20 of the fire victims were children, according to local media.
Erdogan declared Wednesday a day of national mourning following the tragedy which occurred at the height of the winter tourist season, with many families from Istanbul and Ankara heading to the Bolu Mountains to ski.