Death toll in Karachi shopping mall blaze rises to 71, may go up further as search operation still on
&imwidth=600&imheight=450&format=webp&quality=medium "Death toll in Karachi shopping mall blaze rises to 71, may go up further as search operation still on")
File photo of firefighters in action when the shopping mall in Karachi was in flames. Photograph: (AFP)
Though the shopping mall was heavily crowded due to the ongoing wedding season, only three of the 16 exits were open, while all others were locked, senior police official Syed Asad Raza told a news agency.
The death toll in the blaze at Karachi’s shopping mall Gul Plaza crossed 70 on Friday as rescuers found more remains from the rubble of the gutted shopping centre. Karachi Police surgeon Dr Summaiya Syed issued an updated list of 71 deceased. The identification of nine of the 16 deceased so far could be done by DNA tests, which have been performed for 49 samples. Only partial remains of some bodies were found, and authorities could collect 67 skulls, reported BBC, citing the deputy commissioner of police.
The devastating blaze erupted on the night of January 17 and took nearly two days to be fully extinguished. The fire has left the building in ruins, and some sections have even collapsed.
As more bodies were recovered from different parts of the building, officials said the final toll will be determined only when the identification of all the remains is completed.
‘Search operation in final stages,’ says official
South Deputy Commissioner (DC) Javed Nabi Khoso told reporters on Friday that the search operation was in the “final stages”. “The search in the wreckage will be completed today,” he said.
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A total of 77 persons had been reported missing, he said, adding that the rescue and search operation is being done under the supervision of the Sindh Building and Control Authority’s (SBCA) team.
Gul Plaza had housed some 1,200 shops, spread across multiple floors. The shopping mall was heavily crowded, as the wedding season is on.
Senior police official Syed Asad Raza told Reuters news agency that only three of the shopping mall’s 16 exits were open and all others were locked.
‘Rescue workers have not been able to reach the ground floor yet’
Director General of Sindh Rescue 1122, Brigadier (retd) Wajid Sibghatullah Mahar said rescue personnel will continue their recovery efforts in “10 to 15 per cent” of the area that they had been unable to access before.
“We have not been able to reach the ground floor, where the fire erupted. We hope to find bodies from there,” the Rescue 1122 DG told the media.
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Mahar asserted that the teams had modern equipment, but the inferno had turned into a third-degree fire by the time rescue personnel reached the site.
“Either the fire safety system was not present in the building, or it was not activated,” Mahar said.
