BRAZIL: Mother remembers son killed in nightclub fire

Record ID: 831464

  • Title: BRAZIL: Mother remembers son killed in nightclub fire
  • Date: 30th January 2013
  • Summary: A PHOTOGRAPH OF GELSA BARCELLOS' SON WHO DIED IN THE FIRE, JOAO CARLOS BARCELLOS, WHEN HE WAS ONE-YEAR-OLD PHOTOGRAPH OF GELSA BARCELLOS' SON WHO DIED IN THE FIRE, JOAO CARLOS BARCELLOS WHEN HE WAS TWO-YEARS-OLD
  • Embargoed: 14th February 2013 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Brazil
  • Country: Brazil
  • Topics: Accidents
  • Reuters ID: LVAC7IWSAGCF1R2DUPHAH7SGZD0S
  • Story Text: Hundreds of Brazilian families are trying to pick up the pieces and come to grips with the loss of their sons and daughters and brothers and sisters after a devastating nightclub fire killed 235 people, many of them students, in a southern Brazilian city last weekend.
    This week has seen a marathon of funerals in Santa Maria, many with parents burying their children.
    A full investigation is underway at the Kiss nightclub to answer how such a tragedy could happen, but Gelsa Barcellos, who lost her only child in the fire, says she is just trying to find a way to carry on.
    Her son, Joao Carlos, was 34-years-old and worked as a computer technician. He had designed the nightclub's website.
    When Reuters spoke to his mother at her home on Wednesday (January 30), just three days after she lost her son, she was dressed in his clothes, down to his shoes.
    Barcellos said she could hardly understand what was happening after hearing about the fire and rushing to the scene where she identified the body of her only child.
    "It was like a movie, something I've only seen in American movies [when I arrived to the scene]. There was an army of people, psychologists, doctors, nurses. They gave us water and they asked me if I was ok [after identifying the body]. And at that moment I couldn't be well. I raised him on my own since he was six-months-old, after I separated with his father. Then his dad died when he was eight-years-old. I carried him for nine months and now I am the one who has to bury him," Barcellos said.
    Since that tragic night, Barcellos said she has been sleeping in Joao Carlos' bed.
    As she looked around at his things - his work table, his computer and his empty bed - she remembered the plans her son had before his life was cut short.
    "His dream was to do an exchange in London, because he really wanted to go to London to show what he could do [he was a computer technician and designed the nightclub's website]," remembered Barcellos.
    Joao Carlos graduated from the university in Santa Maria. He had just recently started working at the Kiss nightclub.
    His mother, a local schoolteacher, said she dedicated her life to raising her son, and it was almost always just the two of them in the home where they lived together.
    "I am trying [to get by] but it will take time. He was everything for me. Before buying something for myself, I'd give him a gift," Barcellos said.
    She said the disaster has been devastating for everyone involved, including the owners of the club, who are being investigated by police.
    Investigators have said the club's sole exit was partially blocked and that fire extinguishers and emergency exit lights weren't working.
    Police said that the lapses led to the deadly stampede. For Barcellos, the legal ramifications mean little at the moment.
    "Justice is relative, you need proof. Right now everyone is hurting, the parents, the owners. My son was just starting, but he wanted to be a partner at that club," she said.
    Police said one of the club's owners, who is in police custody for questioning along with his co-owner, tried on Tuesday (January 29) to choke himself with a shower hose at a local hospital.
    The owner, identified by police as Elissandro Spohr, told officials he could not bear the strain of the tragedy.
    Two members of Gurizada Fandangueira, the band that was performing at the club, are also in custody for questioning.
    One of the band members, police believe, lit an outdoor flare during the show, igniting overhead soundproofing material.
    None of the four men has been charged with any crime.
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