At least 500 homes gutted in fire believed to be caused by a lit mosquito repellent coil
A lit mosquito repellent coil is believed to have caused a massive fire in a crowded slum that has burnt down at least 500 homes in Gazipur’s Tongi on Saturday.
Flames erupted at the slum near the Sena Kalyan Commercial Complex mall around 4:30am, said local city corporation councilor Gias Uddin.
As many as nine firefighting units from Tongi, Uttara and Kurmitola rushed to the scene and managed to bring the blaze under control by 5:45am, he said.
A fire, that would go on to gut 500 shanties, rages on in a Tongi slum on Saturday, November 27, 2021 Dhaka Tribune
“The fire first started in a shack in the slum and quickly spread due to the close proximity of the housing units,” he told Dhaka Tribune.
Iqbal Hossain, senior officer at Tongi Fire Service station, said the shacks were so close to each other that fire trucks could not enter the slum.
“We had to put out the fire using water from outside the slum,” he said before adding the fire did not claim any lives.
It is suspected that the fire may have started from a lit mosquito repellent coil, according to Iqbal.
“There were cooking gas cylinders in almost all of the homes. Due to the heat of the fire, gas leaked through the pipes and the fire spread rapidly,” he said.
Fire incidents quadruple in 20 years
The number of fires in Bangladesh has increased fourfold over the last two decades as the country’s urban areas are expanding without basic infrastructure like fire stations.
According figures by the Fire Service and Civil Defence, around 285,000 fire incidents occurred in the country between January 1, 1999 and December 31, 2020.
These fires caused an estimated loss of around Tk6,900 crore.
Besides, at least 2,308 people were killed in fires across the country between 2004 and 2020, according to Fire Service data.
