Camden prepare the relief centre at Swiss Cottage Leisure Centre

RESIDENTS told to leave their flats on the Chalcots estate were advised to stay with friends and family for the night, but people with nowhere to go were handed airbeds in a hall at the Swiss Cottage Leisure Centre while Camden Council searched for hotel spaces.

When the hall at the leisure centre reached capacity, the council lined up taxis to take evacuated residents to the Camden Centre in King’s Cross. The operation, partly staffed by volunteers, saw people leave their homes with overnight bags and pull alongs. Children could be seen leaving pillow. One had a hamster in a cage. Families had been warned that work to make the tower blocks safe could take three weeks, although controlled visiting to their flats will be possible in the coming days.

Some tenants stared in disbelief as they came home from work to find  the evacuation taking place. It is understood that some refused to leave and through the night some lights could be seen in individual flats on the estate.

At the relief centre, ward councillor Jonny Bucknell said their had been a mixed reaction with some furious at what had happened, and others making the best of it. “An old lady said it’s the most fun we’ve had in years,” he said.

Among the volunteers was a group of Sikh aid workers who had been coming home from running a soup kitchen at Grenfell tower when they heard what was happening in Camden. They stopped and distributed water and bananas.

Harmi Kaler, of World Sikh Aid, said: “We’ve been at Grenfell for the last six days We just finished off a shift over there at about 12pm, we were going back to Ealing, put the radio on and we heard about this in Camden, so we headed back. People are confused, people are quite uncomfortable. There’s people that don’t want to leave their homes. ”

He added: “We were doing a soup kitchen outside Grenfell supplying food to all the emergency services. We went down to a supermarkert and filled up with fruit and water. We know a lot of people are going to be breaking their fast soon. We haven’t got any halal food, but we know they can have some fruit and water.  It’s quite hot and humid downstairs [in the refuge centre], so we’ve got plenty of water.”