At least 69 people have died in a huge blaze that tore through apartment buildings also used as chemical warehouses in an old part of the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka, fire officials said Thursday.
Dozens of people were trapped in the buildings, unable to escape onto narrow streets clogged with traffic, as the highly combustible stores of chemicals, body sprays and plastic granules erupted in flames.
Fire control room official Mahfuz Riben told AFP that 69 people had been killed while Bangladesh’s fire service chief Ali Ahmed said the death toll could rise further.
“The number of bodies may increase. The search is still going on,” he told AFP.
Ahmed said the blaze at Chawkbazar in the old part of the city may have started with a gas cylinder before quickly spreading through a building where chemicals were stored.
The flames raced through four adjoining buildings, which were also used as chemical warehouses.
“There was a traffic jam when the fire broke out. It spread so quickly that people could not escape,” he said, describing a part of town where the streets are very narrow and residential buildings stand just centimetres apart.
Another fire official told reporters the blaze, which began around 10.40pm (16:40 GMT) on Wednesday, has been “confined” but not yet extinguished despite the efforts of more than 200 firefighters.
“It will take time. This is not like any other fire,” he said, adding the inferno became so devastating due to the “highly combustible” chemicals stored there.
TV images showed the main gate of one of the buildings was locked, leaving its residents trapped, unable to escape the blaze as it swept through its five storeys.
