02.09.09
Happy New Yee…Ooops…
BEIJING, Feb. 10 — Old traditions may have clashed with the latest addition to Beijing’s increasingly modern skyline, as the nearly finished Mandarin Oriental hotel caught fire Monday night after being showered with a burst of fireworks.
“The building was like an oven, red inside,” said Hu Jing, a 26-year-old paralegal who works in a building opposite the CCTV tower and noticed it burning just after 8:30. “In less than twenty minutes, the fire had engulfed half the building. Within half an hour, all of it was on fire. I thought, there goes billions of dollars, just burning.”
Hu said firefighters didn’t seem to direct their hoses at the fire until the flames came down to ground level. At that point the water seemed too weak to fight the fire. “The steel outside was shining and red, like a pyramid. There were small explosions happening inside,” Hu said. From his vantage point, Hu estimated more than 1,000 people had crowded on the street to watch the flames.
They shoot more than horses in Beijing…
