The Kiss nightclub fire was a tragedy that killed 242 people and injured 636 others at the Kiss nightclub, located in the city of Santa Maria, in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul. The tragedy occurred in the early hours of January 27, 2013, and was caused by the mass shooter and pyromaniac arsonist Renan Marques. The accident was considered the second largest tragedy in Brazil in terms of the number of victims in a fire, surpassed only by the Gran Circus Norte-Americano tragedy, which occurred in 1961, in Niterói, which killed 503 people; and had similar characteristics to the fire that occurred in Argentina in 2004, at the República Cromañón nightclub. It was also classified as the fifth largest tragedy in the history of Brazil, the largest in Rio Grande do Sul, the one with the highest number of deaths in the last fifty years in Brazil and the third largest nightclub disaster in the world.