By Peter Lesser (staff@latinospost.com) | First Posted: Apr 26, 2013 10:31 AM EDT
Tags Moscow

Psychiatric hospitals are commonly associated with tragedy. The thought of even visiting is daunting to most people. They're occupied with those who are deemed unfit to participate in everyday life, casting them aside in a controlled environment with hopes of improving their mental stability. The connotations can make the fainthearted cringe as they conjure images of loony patients and horror movies. These are common nightmares associated with the psychiatric hospital, but tragedy of another breed struck a Russian institution Friday morning, leaving more than three dozen dead.

At least 38 people died in a fire early Friday, April 26, at a psychiatric hospital outside Moscow. Authorities said the fire erupted inside the one-story building at around 1:30 a.m. Forty-one people were inside, 38 of which were patients.

One nurse and two patients escaped the flames, the nurse helping one through the corridors toward safety. They were the only three survivors.

At least 29 of those killed failed to outrun the rapidly growing blaze, which burned them alive. Authorities pronounced the remaining nine dead by smoke inhalation.

Investigators searched for signs of arson, however, they believe that a lit cigarette sparked the fire after someone carelessly tossed it aside without properly extinguishing it.

It took firefighters an hour to arrive to the hospital due to their 50 kilometer (31 mile) trek. A closed bridge also delayed the firefighters response time. By the time they arrived, it was too late to help those inside the burning hospital.

Due to heavy medication resulting in sedation, many patients were unable to react to the encroaching flames, which burned them alive in their beds.

"All of the victims were found in their beds, including two nurses," said Yuri Deshevij of the Emergency Situations Ministry. "There was no one in the hallways."

"The rooms where the patients were found had no doors through which they could have left the building under their own power," said Irina Gumennaya, a spokeswoman for the Russian investigation Committee.

President Vladimir Putin called for a thorough investigation into the deadly fire and asked regional authorities to pay more attention to safety regulations. 

Russia already has a poor fire safety record, with about 12,000 deaths reported in 2012. In January, a fire in an underground parking lot killed 10 migrant workers from Tajikistan who were working and living there. In a similar incident in September, 14 Vietnamese workers were killed by fire at a clothing factory near Moscow.

The hospital now lies in ruins, a charred ghost land. 

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