An arson attack hit the Mutualité headquarters, 68, rue Carnot in Poitiers, Thursday December 19, 2024, from 8 p.m. “We were originally contracted for a smoke release from the roofexplained Lieutenant Emmanuel Toy, group leader on this disaster. We were forced to conduct reconnaissance throughout the building to find the origin of this smoke. »
Archives are destroyed
In the store’s parking lot, the fire fighters first found the first outbreak of fire, without too many consequences on level -1, in the cleaning lady’s room. Then a real fire in a room containing the Mutuality archives on level –2.
The twenty-three firefighters involved in this disaster were forced to go out and spread out approximately 10 m3 papers to be sure to completely extinguish the fire. Archives are burned, sooted or soaked.
Three rescue centers were mobilized with the support of two fire-fighting vehicles, two air assets (large scale) and a respiratory assistance vehicle.
The cleaning lady raised the alarm
It was the cleaning lady who raised the alarm. The director of the Mutualité, Hervé Dauge, was present on site at 10:30 p.m. He hoped to be able to reopen the site normally on Friday morning if security conditions permit. He wanted to be reassuring about the consequences of the destroyed archives: “IT has not been affected, our servers are located on the floors, there will be no impact on our activity. »
The Mutuality has forty-five employees. It brings together a personal assistance and home nursing care service (Ssiad) on the ground floor, management, human and administrative resources on 1is floor, a medico-social support service for adults with mental disabilities (Samsah) on 2e floor, retirement funds and meeting room on 3e floor and the works council on 4e floor.
Break-in
In addition to the two intentional fires observed in the parking lot, the entrance door was broken into. Two technicians from the technical and scientific police collected prints. An investigation has been opened. The director will file a complaint.
