Huge flames in the middle of the night: A fire in a residential building in eastern China killed at least 15 people and injured 44 on Friday, according to a preliminary report by Nanjing city authorities released on Saturday.
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The causes of the fire are under investigation, but initial indications suggest that the fire broke out where electric two-wheelers were parked, authorities said at a conference in the early hours of Saturday.
Nanking, the former capital of the empire, is located about 260 kilometers northwest of Shanghai.
#China Four people died after a building fire broke out in the city of Nanjing, capital of east China's Jiangsu Province, on Friday morning.
The cause of the accident is currently being investigated. -Chinadailypic.twitter.com/v0MC6nmN7Z
– WORLD AT WAR (@World_At_War_6) February 23, 2024
The city's mayor, Chen Zhichang, expressed his condolences and apologies to the families of the victims.
According to authorities, two of the 44 people hospitalized are in serious condition.
The fire, which broke out at 4:39 a.m. (2039 GMT) on Friday, likely surprised residents as they slept.
According to the emergency services, 25 fire engines were used to extinguish the fire.
Images posted on Chinese social media show the top of a skyscraper engulfed in flames in the middle of the night, with massive black smoke billowing out of it.
Learn lessons
Other images show gigantic flames consuming several floors of the building. The flashing lights of emergency vehicles can be seen nearby in the dark.
In videos taken early in the morning, presumably after the fire was extinguished, white smoke rose from at least five different parts of the building.
Due to the sometimes lax enforcement of safety standards, fires and other fatal accidents occur frequently in China.
In January, at least 39 people died in a shop fire in the center of the country.
According to authorities, the fire broke out in the basement of a store when workers “violated rules” while at work.
Chinese President Xi Jinping then called for lessons to be learned from the disaster in order to avoid further tragedies.
Five days earlier, 13 schoolchildren died in a fire in a boarding school dormitory.
In April 2023, a rare fire in Beijing killed 29 people and forced desperate patients to jump out of windows to escape.