Scores killed in factory fires

Sep 12 2012

The death toll from two devastating factory fires in Pakistan has risen to at least 128, officials said.

The fire at a garment factory in the southern city of Karachi killed 103 people, while a blaze at a shoe factory in the eastern city of Lahore killed 25.

Dozens more were injured in the blazes that erupted late on Tuesday night, and firefighters were still trying to subdue the Karachi blaze. Fire chiefs said most of the garment factory deaths were caused by suffocation as people caught in the basement were unable to escape.

The Civil Hospital in Karachi said many of the bodies were so badly burned that it was impossible to tell whether they were male or female.

Workers in Lahore told how their colleagues were trapped behind blocked exits and firefighters said one reason why the blazes were so deadly was that the buildings lacked clear escape routes. Such safety issues are common throughout Pakistan, where buildings also lack emergency equipment like alarms and sprinklers and municipal rules are rarely enforced.

Pakistani television showed a video of the five-storey Karachi factory with flames leaping from top-floor windows and smoke billowing into the night sky. Firefighters could be seen pounding on the metal grates covering some of the windows and pulling out smoke-covered bodies.

Many of the workers were injured when they jumped from the burning building, said doctors at the Civil Hospital. Senior police official Amjad Farooqi said: "There were no safety measures taken in the building design. There was no emergency exit. All the people got trapped."

In Lahore, the fire swept through a four-storey shoe factory and killed 25 people, some from burns and some from suffocation, said senior police officer Multan Khan. The factory was illegally set up in a residential part of the city.

It broke out when people in the building were trying to start their generator after the electricity went out. Sparks from the generator made contact with chemicals used to make the shoes, igniting the blaze.

Pakistan's prime minister Raja Pervaiz Ashraf expressed shock and grief over the deaths in both cities.