International NightLife Association

Maurizio Pasca, 2ond Vice president at the International Nightlife Association and president of the European Nightlife Association and Joaquim Boadas, General Secretary of the International Nightlife Association will visit the site of the tragedy in Bucharest were the fire occurred last friday, and at the same time have a meeting with the Romanian authorities in order to be as helpful as possible on matters related to nightclubs security and to express support to the authorities and the families of the victims and injured people. As a matter of fact, only one month ago was held in Ibiza the 2ond International Nightlife Congress, where Robert Keys, former Batallion Chief of the New York Fire Department (FDNY) offered a speech on Nightclub fires and how to prevent them. On the same panel, Miquel Picas, Chief Operations Officer at the security certifying company ICDQ offered a speech talking about  the International Safety Seal for nightclubs in order to avoid tragedies like the one occurred now in Bucharest and Yolanda Perdomo, Director of the Affiliate members program of the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) offered a speech talking about “Tourism and Security”. All of them in their respective speeches highlighted the necessity that all nightclubs all over the world meet security measures, otherwise the risk of a tragedy like the one occurred now in Bucharest or the one occurred in Brazil two years ago are more likely to happen, and when they happen they take innocent people’s lives away and at the same time damage the nightlife industry prestige, the reputation of a city, a country and even the tourism in general.  

To avoid these tragedies to happen in the future, the International Nightlife Association is working since two years ago on the “International Nightlife Safety Seal” and those establishments that have implemented all its safety requirements can guarantee the safety of their patrons. So, since the presentation of the seal in Ibiza last month together with the certifying security company ICDQ, which is in charge of the inspection previous to the distinctive granting, we are recommending all governments worldwide to implement in their countries the international security seal for nightclubs, and for that we are working together with the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) to offer to all the countries affiliated to the organization the implementation of the seal in order to guarantee the safety of their citizens and visitors. As an example, we can mention that some of the requirements checked to gain access to the certificate are the following: clearly lighted emergency exits, flame retardant and fire-resistant structure, construction, decorative elements and furnishings, smoke detectors and sprinklers, non-flammable insulation, trained security personnel, fire extinguishers checked regularly and other instruments to ensure patrons safety.  

So, the implementation of the seal is something that we are going to offer to the Romanian authorities since we find appalling that some clubs in Bucharest have recently admitted safety failures after the fire at Colectiv. We only hope that this tragedy ensures that every effort is done all over the world to avoid such another tragedy like this to happen again. And for that we will also propose the holding of an urgent meeting with European authorities in Brussels to talk about security in nightclubs.

At last we have to mention that we applaud the detention of the Colectiv nightclub owners for suspected manslaughter since, in our opinion and on the basis of the result of the investigation that is being made,  it was a total  irresponsibility to use fireworks in the interior of the club with a non-inflammable sponge ceiling that besides when burnt emitted toxic gasses and we also find unacceptable that only one exit was working and there was no emergency exit, becoming it all in all a death trap.