More than 200 firefighters have battled to extinguish a huge blaze at a block of flats in London which echoed the deadly Grenfell Tower fire of 2017.
Two people have been taken to hospital and more than 100 evacuated from their homes after the blaze engulfed the high rise block in Freshwater Road, Dagenham.
Forty fire engines attended the scene and the London Fire Brigade declared a major incident.
Residents spoke of rushing to safety from the building in the early hours of Monday morning, some having been awoken by neighbors banging on their front door.
Authorities had begun work on removing cladding from the mixed-use tower block that included homes and businesses shortly before the blaze.
Architectural cladding solutions firm Valcan recently posted on social media that it was working to remove “non-compliant cladding” on the building.
Recent years have seen local authorities across the UK strive to remove …