Dark smoke continued to billow from the scorched remnants of several high-rise buildings in Hong Kong on Thursday, more than 21 hours after a devastating fire consumed the complex. The incident tragically claimed at least 44 lives and left more than 270 individuals missing, according to The New York Times.
Firefighters used high-pressure hoses to saturate the towers, aiming to fully extinguish the conflagration, which ranks as Hong Kong's deadliest building fire in more than 5 decades. The origin of the fire, which ignited around 2:50 p.m. on Wednesday and quickly spread across multiple high-rise structures, was not immediately determined. Nonetheless, authorities suspect that exterior building materials at the apartment complex did not meet fire-safety standards, which may have allowed the blaze to spread rapidly.
The Hong Kong police announced Thursday that they had detained a consultant and two directors from a construction firm under suspicion of manslaughter. Senior police superintendent Lai Yee Chung indicated at a press conference on Thursday that flammable foam boards were installed outside the elevator lobby windows on every floor of one structure. Those responsible for the construction demonstrated "gross negligence," The New York Times reported the authorities believe.
By Thursday morning, an unspecified number of residents remained trapped inside, officials noted. To combat the situation, over 1,200 ambulance and fire personnel were dispatched, and the authorities evacuated more than 900 people to temporary shelter.
The tall buildings are part of the dense Wang Fuk Court complex, which contains approximately 2,000 apartments and was erected in the early 1980s. At the time the fire struck, the structures were encased in bamboo scaffolding, a common material for construction and repair work in Hong Kong.
