Hong Kong’s worst fire in generations fuels scrutiny of safety lapses

In Hong Kong, a city where millions of residents sleep, eat and work high above the ground in towers pressed together like books on a shelf, there has long been the threat that a massive fire could trap people inside their high-rises.

By Thursday, the scale of that nightmare emerged, as an inferno that had begun with one 32-story building and quickly engulfed six other towers at an ageing apartment complex killed at least 83 people, with dozens of people still unaccounted for.

It was the deadliest blaze in Hong Kong in decades, surpassing the toll of a tenement fire that killed 59 people in 1957.

Hundreds of firefighters worked to put out flames that continued to burn in three buildings of the Wang Fuk Court complex in Tai Po district 24 hours after they were first reported on Wednesday afternoon.

They searched for survivors who had been trapped inside the buildings, pulling both people and corpses out. More than 70 others were in the hospital, some in critical condition.

Outside a nearby community centre, dozens of people whose relatives were missing waited in line within a police cordon to see if their loved ones were among those whose bodies had been found.

Investigators began piecing together how the flames had moved so swiftly, homing in on the green construction netting that had shrouded the buildings slated for renovation, as well as polystyrene foam that had apparently been installed on windows.

The police arrested two directors and a consultant linked to a construction company that had installed the construction materials, saying they were suspected of manslaughter and gross negligence.

Residents, many of them older, described narrowly escaping and complained that they had been given no warning, not even by a fire alarm.

Public anger rose over whether Hong Kong’s building-safety system has kept pace with the vulnerabilities of one of the world’s fastest-ageing populations.

Some observers and local politicians began to ask whether the disaster was the result of corruption and a lack of accountability, as residents raised questions about perceived collusion between housing committees that oversee maintenance and renovations of such estates and contractors.

“This is absolutely scandalous, this is not what Hong Kong is known for,” said Emily Lau, a longtime pro-democracy politician and former lawmaker who now hosts an interview show on YouTube. She said the scale of the fire pointed to insufficient government supervision: “This has opened up a can of worms about misconduct.”

In the face of mounting questions and pressure from China’s leader, Xi Jinping, for “all-out efforts” to respond to the disaster, the Hong Kong government moved to show it was taking swift action.

John Lee, the Beijing-backed chief executive of Hong Kong, visited the site and later told reporters that the fires were under control. He announced a 300 million Hong Kong dollar (about $38 million) fund for victims.

His Government also kicked off a citywide inspection of housing estates currently under renovation. The city’s anti-corruption bureau also announced it was setting up a task force to investigate potential corruption related to the construction work on the complex.

The fire was the latest crisis for Lee’s Government, which already faces demands from Beijing to fix Hong Kong’s housing market, one of the least affordable in the world, and shore up the economy.

“A bigger question is this: Should a senior official take overall responsibility for this horrendous fire?” said Wang Xiangwei, an associate professor of journalism at Hong Kong Baptist University.

The authorities said that a preliminary investigation revealed that protective nets, tarpaulin and other materials used for the renovation may not have met fire-safety standards.

They identified the registered contractor for the building complex as Prestige Construction and Engineering Company.

The mesh netting was probably a factor in how quickly the fire spread, said Tony Za, a former chair of the Hong Kong Institute of Engineers Building Division.

Typically made of fibres and plastic, such netting is used to keep construction materials and other objects from falling off bamboo scaffolding — which companies in Hong Kong commonly use when repairing a building’s exterior — and hitting the ground below.

Bamboo scaffolding may have also contributed to the blaze, experts said. The Government announced earlier this year that it would phase out the use of the material and replace it with steel scaffolding, for greater safety.

Last month, another bamboo scaffolding caught fire in Hong Kong’s central business district. That incident, along with the devastating fire this week, would likely accelerate the construction industry’s switch to metal scaffolding, Mr Za said.

The government’s investigation also pointed to foam boards that had been found installed on windows.

One Wang Fuk Court resident, Lau Yu Hung, a 78-year-old resident, said that many of the windows in his building were covered with a thin layer of polystyrene foam, and that he had heard that it was meant to protect the glass from the repairs being done to the facade.

The material blocked much of the light and prevented residents from seeing outside, he said. It was only because of a small gap in the foam covering his bathroom window that he had been able to see that a neighbouring building was on fire and escape in time, he said.

The blaze appeared to be especially dangerous at this complex of about 2,000 units, which housed many retirees. Some residents had lived there for decades after having purchased their apartments through a government-subsidised home ownership program in the 1980s. Lau said he had lived there for 20 years.

Near the complex, dozens of family members still searching for their loved ones gathered outside to file slowly into a community centre where they viewed photos of victims.

S.F. Chiang, 68, had gone there to see if her missing 62-year-old brother and 24-year-old niece were among the victims. But she did not find them among the photos that the police provided. “My heart hurts to think about them,” she said.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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