A fire in the ToNiePokój[a] escape room in Koszalin, Poland, on 4 January 2019, killed five teenage customers and injured an adult employee.
[1][2] Five 15-year-old girls – Amelia Wieczorek, Małgorzata Tymieniecka, Julia Pawlak, Karolina Barabas, and Wiktoria Pietras[3] – died of carbon monoxide poisoning.
[10] The building's windows had been covered with "makeshift walls" and the room in which the victims died in was "no bigger than a closet",[11] being approximately 7 m2 (75 sq ft) in size.
[10] The girls called the fire department and told the dispatcher that they were trapped inside the room, that there was a large amount of smoke, and they requested assistance.
[6] Her father testified in court that he initially thought that the call was a hint to solve the puzzle, but he told her to get to the floor and to try to escape after he realised that there was actually a fire.
[18] Jarosław Szymczyk, Commander-in-Chief of Police, stated that local officials were not made aware of complaints against the escape room.
[20] Immediately after the tragedy, President Andrzej Duda, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, and United States Ambassador to Poland Georgette Mosbacher, amongst others, expressed their condolences to the families of the deceased.
[4] The mayor of Koszalin, Piotr Jedlinski, announced 6 January as a day of mourning for the city,[22] and requested that residents do not hold entertainment events or parties.
[4] Performances at the Bałtycki Teatr Dramatyczny [pl] and cultural events at the Centrum Kultury 105 scheduled for 5 January were cancelled.
[24] The victims of the fire were buried together on 10 January at the Koszalin municipal cemetery,[25] with a song that Wiktoria had written and recorded playing.
[24] Czech and Lithuanian fire officials announced inspections of escape rooms in their respective countries in response to the tragedy.