Hong Kong – According to the number of dead Hong Kong apartment complex fire on Monday they had risen to at least 151, officials said fire investigation He found that the netting used for scaffolding covered by ongoing renovations did not meet fire safety codes.
Frustration over what appears to be a lack of safety before the devastating fire — which took more than two days to extinguish as it engulfed seven of the complex’s eight towers — has stifled criticism of the government’s moves.
Initial tests of the mesh that surrounded the scaffolding showed it met safety standards, but Hong Kong officials said Monday that investigators had since gained access to more areas to collect samples, including high-rises.
Hong Kong’s chief secretary Eric Chan said seven of the 20 new samples of synthetic mesh failed fire safety standards, suggesting contractors chose cost savings over the safety of residents and workers.
“They just wanted to make money at the expense of people’s lives,” Chan told reporters.
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Recovery teams found eight more bodies, including those of three firefighters located earlier, but workers were unable to recover them, Tsang Shuk-yin, head of the Hong Kong Police’s casualty investigation unit, told reporters on Monday. He said more than 30 people were still missing, but some were likely among the nearly 40 recovered remains that had yet to be identified.
“We will have to wait until we pass the seven blocks before we can make a final report,” he said, adding that some of the remains were probably so badly burned that identification may be impossible.
About 4,600 people lived in the eight buildings of the Wang Fuk Court complex, which is located in Hong Kong’s Tai Po district, not far from the border with mainland China.
Monday was the last day of the official period of mourning declared by the authorities, and thousands of people came to pay their respects, leaving flowers, toys and notes to the victims, many of them children and the elderly.
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The police have released pictures of the inside of the buildings they studied, where the bodies of the residents who tried to escape the inferno were found on the stairs and on the roofs.
A distraught man at the scene Monday told CBS News that his sons had just identified the remains of his 66-year-old wife, who died in the fire. He said he was demanding answers from the government as to how the disaster could have happened.
Anger has been building in Hong Kong since the fire broke out on Wednesday morning last week. It had already been revealed that fire alarms had been switched off in the complex, and for months, residents had issued warnings about what they believed to be hazardous materials covering the buildings during renovations.
As of Monday, 14 people had been arrested on suspicion of murder, and authorities were not ruling out more arrests.
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The level of public anxiety has put Beijing on edge, with the central government warning Hong Kongers against any protests or using the fire to “disrupt” life in the city.
The warning drew a parallel repression against pro-democracy protests which paralyzed the city in 2019.
Three people were arrested on Monday under a sweeping national security law imposed after the protests. Their lawyer says they were arrested after launching a petition for an independent investigation into the fire – a sign of concern in Beijing that the tragedy could spark fresh civil unrest in the semi-autonomous southern metropolis.