I am a journalist who always had a phone number in his pocket, said Edgard Alves

In a text published in leaf In 2011, journalist and columnist for the newspaper Edgard Alves, who died this Friday (4th) at the age of 73, reported on his coverage of the fire in the Joelma Building. The tragedy, which took place on February 1, 1974, in downtown São Paulo, resulted in 188 deaths. It is until today the largest of its kind in the capital of São Paulo.

Check below, in full, the text of Edgard, who had access to the building on the day of the fire.

It’s been a dark day, and when those images come back to me, I get goosebumps.

Alerted by colleagues who had heard the start of the fire on the radio, I went straight from the house to the scene.
When I arrived, the building was on fire, screams, lots of screams. I remember a desperate voice: “They’re jumping.”

Chaos, police sirens, firefighters and ambulances, plus helicopter noise.

I got a pay phone and told the newsroom that I was already in the penthouse.

Reporters always had phone chips in their pockets.

Having also followed the Andraus disaster two years earlier, that day I was convinced that if there were any heroes in the world, they were firefighters.

The guys entered that hell to try something, many came back loaded, passed out. A PM came staggering back. He took off the towel that covered his face, I immediately recognized him: Luís Faustino Pires, South American heavyweight champion, who had a fight against George Foreman on his record, a defeat, but in the good times of Foreman.

With a colleague from the Group leafI managed to convince an employee of the building next door, we went in and went up to the top floor.

There I felt, in fact, the pain of a catastrophe: charred bodies on the parapet of one wing of Joelma and, on the other roof, not directly reached by the fire, bodies of asphyxiation victims, approximately 30.

My colleague went into a tailspin, spoke out against politicians, authorities, the military. Firefighters took her downstairs so she could recover.

Shortly after, they broke roof tiles to remove dozens of citizens who tried to escape through there, without success.
Today I am asked to write about that sad day. I resist, but I don’t refuse. After all, despite the new times, I am a journalist who always had a phone number in my pocket.