At least 10 people were killed and 32 others were injured on Tuesday after a fire broke out at a hotel with more than 200 guests at a skiing resort in western Turkey, the authorities said.
The fire at the Grand Kartal Hotel in the town of Kartalkaya in Bolu Province, about 180 miles east of Istanbul, took place over the winter break for schools across the country, a time when families flock to skiing resorts and other vacation spots.
The fire started at around 3:30 a.m. local time, when most occupants were asleep, according to news reports. In an effort to evacuate, some occupants strung bedsheets together to make a rope that they used to descend to a lower floor, video footage showed.
The cause of the fire was unclear.
Television footage showed smoke billowing from a building framed by snow-topped mountains. Dozens of rescuers and fire trucks were dispatched from surrounding towns.
“When I left my room, I saw the flames at the fourth floor, the floor of the restaurant,” Necmi Kepcetutan, a skiing teacher who also worked at the hotel, told the NTV network. “Then it started to swarm the hotel. We helped around a dozen or more people to evacuate as we know the hotel very well.”
“People were screaming to be rescued,” he added.
Two people — a guest and a hotel employee — died after they jumped from the building, the governor of Bolu Province, Abdulaziz Aydin, told Anadolu Agency, a state-run news agency.
The fire took place on the same day as an explosion injured four people at another Turkish ski resort, in the central province of Sivas, the governor’s office said in a written statement.
The reason for the explosion has not yet been determined. Two skiers and one of their trainers were injured slightly, while another trainer had second-degree burns on the hands and face, the statement said.
