# Question about the Rhade Island Fire and 9-11 **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 21, 2003, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-the-rhade-island-fire-and-9-11/156626 "2003-02-21T20:58:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![TJ555\_The\_Golfer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/41988e/32.png) [@TJ555\_The\_Golfer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TJ555_The_Golfer)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2003, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-the-rhade-island-fire-and-9-11/156626/1 "2003-02-21T20:58:59Z")
> [@](#): > > It was the deadliest U.S. fire since 87 people died at the Happy Land Social Club in New York in 1990, a fire authorities blamed on arson. It also came less than a week after 21 people were killed in a stampede at a Chicago nightspot. [http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=514&ncid=514&e=1&u=/ap/20030221/ap\_on\_re\_us/nightclub\_fire\_88](http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=514&ncid=514&e=1&u=/ap/20030221/ap_on_re_us/nightclub_fire_88) Why don’t the fires at the World Trade Center count? After all the fires and their destruction of the towers caused most of the deaths. ---
**Author:** ![TJ555\_The\_Golfer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/41988e/32.png) [@TJ555\_The\_Golfer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TJ555_The_Golfer)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2003, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-the-rhade-island-fire-and-9-11/156626/2 "2003-02-21T21:00:09Z")
Rhode Island, not Rhade Island. Can this be changed? ---
**Author:** ![ltfire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ea924/32.png) [@ltfire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ltfire)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2003, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-the-rhade-island-fire-and-9-11/156626/3 "2003-02-22T01:23:34Z")
Well, first of all, the two horrific incidents that you quoted were not the act of terrorists, as the Trade Center was. Happy Land was one drunken asshole who had a fight with his girlfriend and thought it would teach her a lesson by pouring gas into the only entrance/exit of an illegal club. The Chicago incident should still be fresh in everyones minds…it just occured…and that, so they report, was the act of a few more assholes trying to quell a disturbance with pepper spray. If we are going to start keeping count of TERRORIST fires, let us all hope that The Trade Center remains at number one. ---
**Author:** ![Governor\_Quinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@Governor\_Quinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Governor_Quinn)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2003, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-the-rhade-island-fire-and-9-11/156626/4 "2003-02-22T01:38:56Z")
Probably a matter of classification. The 9-11 events belong more in the catagories of “plane crash” or “terrorism” or “explosion”.