1990 Strangeways Prison riot administrative offices on the lower floor and the chapel on the upper floor. Remand prisoners were held in wings G, H, I and K of a separate prison, linked to the main prison through workshops and a kitchen. The Certified Normal Accommodation Figure for Strangeways, the number of prisoners the prison was designed to hold, was 970. The population of the prison had increased in the months before the riot, from 1,417 in January 1990 to a peak of 1,658 on 27 March. On 1 April, the prison contained 1,647 prisoners – about 925 convicted adult prisoners, 500 remand prisoners
Fremantle Prison riot spread into the rafters, and caused the roof to collapse. The prisoners surrounded their hostages, and in turn were besieged by an armed riot squad inside the prison, and the police riot encircled the prison. Skilled police negotiators communicated with the ring leaders, and by nightfall only five hostages remained. A sixth officer was to have been kept, but was released as he was seriously injured. Meanwhile, the fire brigade had trouble bringing the inferno in the main cell block under control. The prison's gate was too narrow for their trucks to pass, so they had to water the flames