A massive fire has broken out at the Wang Fuk Court high-rise apartment complex in Hong Kongʼs Tai Po district, engulfing seven of the eight buildings. At least 55 people have died and more than 200 are missing, according to the latest reports.
This is reported by AP and BBC.
The fire started on the afternoon of Wednesday, November 26, and quickly spread to neighboring buildings, greatly complicating rescue operations due to the bamboo scaffolding on the facades. The Hong Kong Fire Department classified the fire as a level five incident, the highest on the scale.
Nearly 700 firefighters and rescuers were involved in extinguishing the fire, and approximately 900 residents were evacuated to temporary shelters. Among the dead is a 37-year-old firefighter, another firefighter is in the hospital.
Hong Kong authorities said they had arrested three people, aged 52 to 68 — the heads of a construction company and a consulting engineer — on suspicion of manslaughter. The company was carrying out renovation work at the complex, during which, according to law enforcement, flammable materials may have been used, contributing to the rapid spread of the fire.
Wang Fuk Court, a residential complex of eight 31-story buildings built in 1983, is home to nearly 4 600 people, many of them elderly. The fire was Hong Kongʼs deadliest in decades, following a similar incident in 1996 that killed 41 people.
Local authorities have set up several centers for evacuated residents and a hotline for relatives of the victims. The cause of the fire is still under investigation, but preliminary reports suggest that the rapid spread of the fire was due to bamboo scaffolding and flammable building materials.
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