11 die in fire at Austria elderly home

A fire engulfed a home for the elderly in western Austria on Friday, killing at least 11 people, a local government spokesman said.

Six people were injured, three of them seriously, said Thomas Mair, a spokesman for the regional government in the province of Vorarlberg.

"It is a catastrophe, completely terrible," Austrian Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer was quoted by the Austria Press Agency as saying after arriving at the scene late Friday.

Twenty-three residents and two supervisors were in the building when the fire started, Mair said. He could not immediately identify the dead or the injured.

The 11 victims died of smoke inhalation, APA reported.

Some 250 firefighters battled the blaze, eventually putting it out, Mair said.

Authorities are investigating the cause of the fire, which started in a first-floor room and quickly spread to the rest of the home, according to APA.

Austrian broadcaster ORF reported that thick smoke hampered rescue efforts in the 140-year-old building, which looked from photos to have a ground floor and three upper floors.

Egg, a town of roughly 3,500, is located near an Austrian region known for skiing and hiking.

The fire was the deadliest at an Austrian elderly home in recent memory, APA reported.

Two women burned to death in 1989 in an elderly home in the village of St. Stefan ob Leoben after a fire was sparked by an Easter candle left by a window.