Olympic skier and father killed in fire at abandoned ski hotel in Turkey

Independent

27-03-2025

An Olympic skier and his father have been killed in a fire at closed ski resort hotel in northwest Turkey – two months after a blaze at another Turkish winter resort left 79 dead.
The victims were named as 25-year-old Berkin Usta, a skier who represented Turkey at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympic Games, and his father Yahya Usta, the president of the Turkish Ski and Snowboard Teachers Association.
'I learned with deep sorrow that our national athlete Berkin Usta and his father Yahya Usta lost their lives in the fire that broke out in the hotel,' Sports Minister Osman Askin Bak said.
The Kervansaray Hotel in Uludag, Bursa province, was empty of guests when the fire started at 5.30 a.m. but 12 staff were present, Bursa governor's office said. Several people suffering smoke inhalation were hospitalised.
Yahya Usta, his son and wife, who survived, were staying on the hotel's fifth floor. Authorities haven't said why they were staying at the hotel or if any of them were members of staff.
Bursa Mayor Mustafa Bozbey said that the blaze began in the cafeteria.
Prosecutors have launched an investigation. The state-run Anadolu Agency later reported that the hotel manager had been detained.
The 30-year-old hotel was shut down in early January when its accommodation permit was cancelled, the governor's office said.
Television images showed flames quickly engulfing the six-story hotel, located on the slopes of one of Turkey's most popular ski destinations, less than a three-hour drive from Istanbul.
Fire crews brought the blaze under control within two hours, but not before the upper floors had been gutted.
In January, a 12-story ski resort hotel in northwestern Turkey went up in flames during a school holiday, killing 79. The fire at the Grand Kartal hotel in Kartalkaya, in Bolu province's Koroglu mountains, also started in the hotel's dining area.