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OAKLAND — Doomed partygoers trapped on the second floor of a crudely converted warehouse screamed, “Help us! Help us!” as one of the deadliest structure fires in Oakland’s history ripped through a tinderbox of makeshift living spaces and a labyrinth cluttered with art late Friday night, killing at least 24 people and possibly more.

On Sunday morning, Alameda County Sheriff’s Sgt. Ray Kelly confirmed that they have “24 decreased victims of this fire.”

“We anticipate the number of victims will rise,” Kelly said.

The blaze broke out at an electronic music party at a Fruitvale district live-work space occupied by an arts collective, and firefighters late Saturday were combing through the burned building in search of victims — a process they say may take 48 hours and require bulldozers and cadaver dogs.

Dozens of people waited for news about their loved ones late Saturday night at the coroner’s office.

“It’s like waiting for your name to be called, and if your name is called, it’s going to be the worst day of your life,” Alameda County Sheriff’s Sgt. Ray Kelly said. “It’s very tense in there.”

As the horrific scene unfolded Friday night, people banged on windows when they couldn’t escape down the main path to safety: a steep, rickety staircase cobbled together with wooden pallets and plywood.

Survivors described a chaotic scene of people desperately trying to help their friends but overcome by fire and smoke.

“It was too hot, too much smoke, I had to get out of there,” said Bob Mule, a photographer and artist who lives in the building and who suffered minor burns. “I literally felt my skin peeling and my lungs being suffocated by smoke. I couldn’t get the fire extinguisher to work.”

When he escaped, he could see someone calling for help from the second-floor window, and tried to get a ladder, “but they jumped out the window.”

The building known as the “Ghost Ship” was zoned as a warehouse but had been the subject of a number of complaints about blight and illegal structures inside. On Saturday, city officials acknowledged that inspectors had knocked on the door of the warehouse two weeks ago but left when no one answered.

Outside the smoldering structure Saturday, Oakland police asked for descriptions of tattoos and piercings to help identify the nine bodies removed from the building Saturday as well as another two dozen or more who remain missing, including college students, artists and musicians attending a dance party upstairs. A 10th body had been found as of early Sunday, according to media reports.

It took about four hours to bring the blaze under control; at one point, the roof collapsed. The building had no sprinklers, Oakland fire Chief Teresa Deloach Reed said, and crews did not hear any smoke detectors going off when they arrived.

“We still have to do a more thorough search of the building, and we don’t know the potential number of other victims,” Reed said. No firefighters were reported injured while battling the blaze.

Kelly said emergency responders were prepared Saturday night for a “mass casualty event” that could involve “several dozen fatalities.” He also said that “several dozen” people who were initially reported missing have since been located and are safe.

The plan is to “disassemble the building piece by piece and place the debris into bins,” Kelly said. Heavy equipment could be seen and heard working on the building into Saturday evening.

Authorities were bringing in bulldozers, excavators, cadaver dogs and remote control equipment to find bodies buried beneath a collapsed second floor and roof and hidden within a clutter of pianos, camping trailers, artwork and old furniture.

“It’s very bad wreckage, twisted debris. It’s like a maze: wires, beams, wood,” Kelly said. “It’s all fallen on top of each other. There are places and crevices we can’t get in to.”

Like 9/11 in New York, few victims of the fire were taken to the hospital with injuries, he said. “People either made it out or didn’t make it out.”

Families of the missing gathered at an Alameda County Sheriff’s Department building on Saturday waiting for word. Dan Vega, whose brother Alex is missing, says the wait is unbearable.

“I have my work boots, I have gloves,” Vega said. “I just want to find him.”

Chris, a local musician who asked to use only his first name, said he was in the bathroom when the fire broke out. He walked out into a room filled with thick smoke. The lights had gone out and it was pitch black inside the warehouse space, where only a few moments earlier a group of 40 to 50 people were listening to a DJ play music and waiting for the show to start.

Immediately, people were screaming and trying to direct others to safety. With no lights, and smoke filling the warehouse, it made it difficult for people to find their footing on the somewhat irregularly shaped staircase, which Chris said appeared to have been built in three sections.

“We did that for as long as we could, but when you’re in a burning building, you’re being surrounded by a completely hostile environment,” he said. “It was kind of a free for all.”

Chris said he ran to his car to grab a flashlight and ran back into the building, crawling on his hands and knees, but he couldn’t get to the staircase or help move people to safety. The smoke, which he said hit him “like getting slapped in the face,” made it impossible for him to see or to breathe.

Firefighters started arriving as the flames grew larger and started erupting out of the side of the building.

“I felt so helpless,” he said as he watched the firefighters douse the flames.

The warehouse is one of numerous buildings in Oakland that have been illegally converted into artists collectives that have not been properly inspected, according to City Councilman Noel Gallo. Still, young hipsters looking for cheap, creative communities seek them out to survive in a city where rents are skyrocketing to accommodate an influx of highly paid tech workers.

The “Ghost Ship” was under investigation by city building inspectors just weeks ago amid reports of blight and illegal structures inside. When they knocked on the door to get inside the building Nov. 17, however, no one answered, so they left, according to city officials.

The building is owned by Chor N. Ng, of Oakland, but former residents say Derick Alemany and his wife, Micah, were raising three young children there, although they weren’t in the building when the fire broke out. The couple were the creative force behind the labyrinthine menagerie and collected monthly rent from other artists of between $300 and $600. They held dance parties with live electronic music and charged at the door to help raise money for rent.

In a Facebook post Saturday that was excoriated by readers, Alemany wrote, “Everything I worked so hard for is gone. Blessed that my children and Micah were at a hotel safe and sound. … it’s as if I have awoken from a dream filled with opulence and hope … to be standing now in poverty of self-worth.”

Alemany had advertised on Facebook and Craigslist looking for renters seeking “immediate change and loving revolution,” who enjoyed “poetics, dramatics, film, tantric kitten juggling and nude traffic directing.” He described it as 10,000 square feet of vintage redwood and antique steel “styled beyond compare.”

His 1951 purple Plymouth remained parked Saturday in front of the building that burned so hot, the “Ghost Ship” letters painted across the front had all but melted away.

“They are ex-Burning Man people and had their kids in the place — three kids running around with no shoes,” said DeL Lee, 34, who lived there for three months two years ago. “It was nuts.”

He described the place as a filthy firetrap, with frequent power outages, overloaded outlets, sparks and the smell of burning wire. A camping stove with butane tanks served as the kitchen, and a hole had been chiseled through the concrete wall to access the bathroom at the adjoining automotive repair shop next door.

The staircase, which had two switchbacks to get to the second floor, was built of pallets, plywood and footholds — like a ship’s gangplank — and was like “climbing a fort” to get up and down, say people who had visited the building.

Pianos and old couches doubled as room dividers. Pallets covered with shingles and elaborate trim formed sculptural walls. Often, Lee said, the place was filled with the sounds of sawing and hammering as Alemany continued to build.

“They’d be up all night, til 10 a.m., playing on the piano, banging on the floor, singing — it was crazy,” Lee said.

On Saturday, a candlelight vigil was held at Chapel of the Chimes. The Alameda County Sheriff’s Office also became a painful gathering place of sobs and embraces.

Kimberly Gregory, of South San Francisco, said she was watching the news about the fire, thinking how sad it was, when she got a call from her daughter’s friend asking if Michela, a student at San Francisco State, was safe.

“What do you mean?” Gregory asked. She and her husband raced to Oakland, where they were met by Mayor Libby Schaaf.

Joel Shanahan, the electronic musician who performed as Golden Donna at the Ghost Ship when the fire broke out, confirmed on Facebook that he was safe. “But like many people he is heartbroken and has several friends among the missing,” a post on his Facebook page read.

But Micah Danemayor, who was performing at the warehouse Friday, remains among the missing, along with his girlfriend. Karen Tate, who is close to the Danemayor family, fears they are both dead.

“His passion was the performances. He made his life work so he could do that,” Tate said. “They moved in together, and the next day they perished together. It’s so tragic.”

Staff writers Harry Harris, Sam Richards, Malaika Fraley and Katrina Cameron contributed to this story.