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Footwear factory in flames, four feared fried
The large Swallow sandal factory complex at Kamal Raya, West Jakarta, was heavily damaged in a blaze that lasted more than 24 hours, with four dead and four others injured so far
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he large Swallow sandal factory complex at Kamal Raya, West Jakarta, was heavily damaged in a blaze that lasted more than 24 hours, with four dead and four others injured so far.
“At last count, we suspect four people have died in the fire, all of them still trapped inside the building,” Kalideres Police detective chief second Insp. Herru SY told The Jakarta Post on Friday.
The four were identified as Anrew Andriani, 25, Liana, 24, Parnat, 60, and Rusli, 70, the warehouse chief.
“Two workers, Ace Hidayat, 24, and Supratno, 27, were taken to Atmajaya Hospital while two others, Novaria, 23, and Atma, 29, were taken to Cengkareng Hospital and Bunda Suci Hospital, respectively,” Herru said.
He added the number of victims could increase, as security officials were still not able to
fully evacuate the premises, despite the blaze having been extinguished.
“The building was packed with rubber and chemical substances that burnt easily, so even though the fire has been put out there is still a possibility a blaze may break out again,” he said.
He added that the authorities did not want to take any unnecessary risks, so have decided to wait
until all fire threat had conclusively died down.
Investigators have begun probing the cause of the fire and the total financial loss.
Flames began to burn the three-story factory at around 3 p.m.
on Thursday and were eventually extinguished by 7 p.m. on Friday.
An official from the West Jakarta Fire Department, Heru, said his office deployed 25 fire engines and more than 100 firefighters to the location, but they still had difficulty putting out the blaze because
of all the rubber and chemicals in the factory.
“Even now, the smoke is still so thick it’s difficult to locate any of the victims,” Heru said Friday afternoon.
The dangerously warped and mangled iron and concrete factory structure also poses a risk to efforts to evacuate victims, he said.
Victims would only be able to start being evacuated today.
Herman, an employee at the factory, said it was uncertain how many victims there might be, or what initially sparked the fire.
“We’re still in the process of gathering all information, so we’ll wait for the official findings,” he said.
According to statistics provided by the city’s fire department, there have been 46 fires in Jakarta since the start of the year, with total financial losses estimated at Rp 11.31 billion (US$1.23 million).
Earlier on Thursday, a fire also broke out at the Senen Inpres market in Central Jakarta, razing 250 kiosks and 80 street vendors’ stalls and causing an estimated Rp 8.5 billion in losses.
No casualties were reported in this earlier incident.
Jakarta Governor Fauzi Bowo announced he would renovate the market complex and provide temporary locations for the vendors, but has not specified where they will be moved to.
