One dead, 22 injured in Spain retirement home fire

A fire erupted in a retirement home in northeastern Spain, killing a 93-year-old man and injuring 22 others due to smoke inhalation, officials said Saturday.

The fire broke out in a ground-floor room late on Friday at the home in the northeastern city of Zaragoza, local emergency services wrote on the social network X.

Two men lived in the room, including the one who died, who was disabled and was therefore not able to get out", Zaragoza mayor Natalia Chueca told reporters at the scene.

Another 22 people were taken to the hospital with injuries of varying degrees caused by smoke inhalation, among them a 46-year-old man who lived nearby and had joined the rescue effort, emergency services said.

Several local residents told local media how they worked together with firefighters to evacuate residents, some of whom had to be rescued through broken windows

"We saw smoke and decided to intervene. We broke the windows with a hammer, an axe, chairs from the bars, anything we could get our hands on," local resident Jesus Vadorrey told regional television station Aragon TV.

"It was very agonising because the glass is very thick and people were already suffocating inside."

The head of the regional government of Aragon, Jorge Azcon, thanked bystanders for their help, telling reporters that without them "we would probably be mourning even greater losses than we are today".

Police have launched an investigation into the blaze. The director of the home said it may have been caused by an overheating electric wheelchair battery charger.