F

ire engulfed around 75 houses in a densely populated area in Rawa Buaya, West Jakarta on Wednesday.

There were no casualties in the incident, but 350 people were left homeless and forced to seek shelter elsewhere. A witness, Joko, 32, said the fire was seen to start in the house of a man named Dulkamit, 65, at 8:30 a.m.

'€œIt was probably because of a short circuit,'€ he said, as quoted by beritajakarta.com.

Joko said residents tried to extinguish the fire, but they were overwhelmed by the flames that quickly engulfed the combustible materials in the houses such as wood, bamboo and plywood. Kamil, a 43-year-old West Jakarta Fire Department officer, said his department deployed 14 fire trucks to extinguish the blaze.

'€œThe site was hard to reach as our vehicles were halted by many illegal buildings,'€ he said.

Rawa Buaya subdistrict head Ridwan the victims were temporarily relocated to the nearby Al-Hasmi mosque.