Dupont Plaza Hotel fire
The Dupont Plaza Hotel fire occurred on December 31, 1986, at a luxury resort in Puerto Rico, during a time of escalating tensions between hotel management and its workers over wage disputes. In an attempt to provoke a response from management, three disgruntled employees set a fire in a storage room using cooking oil, which rapidly escalated into a catastrophic fireball that spread throughout the hotel. Within minutes, the flames engulfed the lobby and adjacent areas, creating chaos as guests struggled to escape, with many resorting to jumping from windows or using elevators that led to flaming exits. Tragically, the incident resulted in the deaths of 97 individuals, primarily from asphyxiation, and left over 140 injured.
The aftermath of the fire led to significant legal repercussions, as the hotel was sued by thousands of plaintiffs for negligence, particularly for lacking adequate fire safety measures. This disaster not only resulted in the hotel's permanent closure but also prompted widespread reforms in fire prevention and safety protocols across the hospitality industry. The event also highlighted the social and economic disparities within the region, particularly between the affluent tourist sector and local workers, who often struggled with low wages. Ultimately, the Dupont Plaza Hotel never reopened under its original name and was transformed into the San Juan Marriott and Stellaris Casino.
Dupont Plaza Hotel fire
The Event A massive fire at a hotel-casino along Puerto Rico’s upscale north shore killed ninety-seven people
Date December 31, 1986
Place El Condado Beach, San Juan, Puerto Rico
Deliberately set as part of an escalating contract dispute between hotel management and labor, the catastrophic New Year’s Eve fire not only exposed the hotel’s inadequate emergency preparedness but also underscored wider economic problems confronting the Caribbean tourist industry.
During December, 1986, the management of the Dupont Plaza Hotel, a luxury resort along Puerto Rico’s Gold Coast, had tried unsuccessfully to renegotiate a contract with hotel workers, who were threatening to strike during the lucrative holiday season. The hotel had received menacing letters and even bomb threats, and disgruntled workers had set three small fires trying to unsettle hotel operations and encourage a favorable settlement. However, concerned guests had been reassured by management that the hotel had not been specifically threatened. When management would not concede to union demands for higher wages, the union voted at an emergency mid-afternoon meeting on New Year’s Eve to strike at midnight. Less than ten minutes after the meeting, around 3:30 p.m., three workers—Héctor Escudero, Armando Jimenez, and José Francisco Rivera Lopez—angered over the impending strike and intending to cause property damage to the hotel, used cooking oil from the hotel’s kitchens to start a fire in a second-floor storage room filled with unused furniture. The furniture quickly caught fire, and its protective plastic wrapping gave off thick, toxic fumes. Within minutes, a massive fireball spread first to the adjacent ballroom and then to the lobby.
Holiday tourists panicked as the superheated air and smoke from the fire threatened the second-floor casino. Hotel security, long concerned with monitoring activity within the casino, had routinely chain-locked all doors other than the casino’s main entrance, which became engulfed in flames. Desperate to exit, guests hurled themselves out of windows or swarmed into elevators and stairwells, only to find the ground floor in flames. Within fifteen minutes, 97 people died, most from asphyxiation. More than 140 were injured. The three hotel workers were eventually found guilty of murder, arson, and conspiracy. In one of the largest civil lawsuits ever filed, the hotel was sued by more than two thousand plaintiffs seeking damages of almost $2 billion. The plaintiffs charged hotel management with failing to provide adequate warning and lacking sufficient emergency procedures (the hotel did not have fire sprinklers). The Dupont Plaza never reopened under that name. Instead, it was sold to the Marriott chain, completely refurbished, and reopened as the San Juan Marriott and Stellaris Casino.
Impact
In addition to triggering an industry-wide reform of fire-prevention measures and evacuation procedures, the terrorist attack on the Dupont Plaza underscored the disparity in the Caribbean between the wealthy tourists upon whom the region’s tourism industry depends and the indigenous population that maintains that industry, often at wages just above the poverty line.
Bibliography
Dietz, James L. An Economic History of Puerto Rico. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1987.
Monge, Jose Trias. Puerto Rico: The Trials of the Oldest Colony in the World. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1999.
Noon, Randall K. Engineering Analysis of Fires and Explosions. Boca Raton, Fla.: CRC Press, 1995.