The Jungle by Wilbert Rideau 1975

ANGOLA - Saturday, March 1, 1975. It was about six in the afternoon. Supper had just been served and kitchen workers were cleaning up the dining hall, hurrying to get off work. Outside the huge chow hall, prisoners were going to and fro, and those having no particular place to go loafed about the dormitories, swapping stories or concocting schemes with their buddies, killing time, the objective of every prisoner. Security officers watched them (as always), moving among them yet apart from them - always apart. There is always that invisible line that separates the powerful from the powerless, rendering them aliens unto each other. But, unknown to any of them, they would come together this evening, in a way that they rarely do.

A prisoner, en route to a church service, glanced casually at Cell Block D as he passed . . . and froze. The lower left tier of the cellblock, reserved as an Administrative Lockdown section, was so filled with smoke that he could see absolutely nothing through the windows. Knowing this section usually to be filled with prisoners, he moved fast, informing the guards of the situation. Alerted, they rushed to get the men out of that tier but the doors jammed, refusing to open. A call went to the welders to bring cutting torches, but it would take time for them to arrive, perhaps too much time. Someone, obviously thinking of this, yelled, "Bust the windows!" and inmates quickly began breaking windows the entire length of the building. Thick black smoke billowed forth from the broken windows, rising above the building like a dark omen to the hundreds of Medium Yard prisoners staring helplessly through the tall fence that separated them from the cell block.

It was terrible. Prisoners raced the distance to the hospital for stretchers and oxygen, knowing they would be needed. Security personnel ran to and fro hunting for fire extinguishers, fear and urgency etched horribly on their faces. Some yelled and others cried, tears running down some of the most hardened faces imaginable as if it was the most natural thing in the world, beating their fists against the wall as they waited for the welders, torn apart by the knowledge that the trapped men could be dying and they could do nothing about it. The fear, the raging need to do something, and the sense of impotence that gripped the waiting men was maddening. And, in that moment, all of those petty class lines that we draw in daily life to separate us from each other were forgotten. Old hates, class distinctions, and racial and religious differences took flight. There were only human beings afraid for fellow human beings and seething at their inability to do something to help them.

Finally, after what seemed an eternity but was only a few minutes, the welders arrived and quickly cut through to the trapped men. The waiting men rushed into the smoke-filled tier, dragging the inmates out. Some were as limp as wet dishrags. Others, in better shape, walked out. All received treatment at the prison hospital, with a couple being sent to Baton Rouge - but aside from a little smoke inhalation, there were no real injuries to speak of.

Somehow, a stack of mattresses had caught fire and gone undetected by personnel on duty. With all of the doors and windows shut, the area filled with smoke, threatening the 25 inmates locked in there.

The crisis over, everyone went their separate ways, resuming their former roles: white and black, powerful and powerless, guard and prisoner, friends and enemies, and so on. The class lines returned, making a mockery of our brief experience in brotherhood . . . and therein lay the tragedy.