A fire tore through an overcrowded block during a jail in Indonesia’s western Banten province, killing a minimum of 41 people and injuring dozens, a government spokeswoman and media reports said.
The fire, which broke out between 1 to 2 am civil time on Wednesday at the Tangerang Prison Block C, has been extinguished and authorities are still evacuating the power, said Rika Aprianti, a spokeswoman of the corrections department of the law and human rights ministry.
Investigators from the hearth department said that they’re also watching the defective electrical wiring as a source of the hearth.
Al Jazeera’s Jessica Washington, reporting from outside the prison complex, said that a minimum of eight of the quite 70 inmates who were injured is in critical condition with over 90 percent body burns.
Kebakaran melanda Lembaga Pemasyarakatan (Lapas) Kelas 1 Tangerang, Kota Tangerang, pada hari Rabu 8 September 2021 dini hari. Kebakaran ini menyebabkan sebanyak 72 orang mengalami luka-luka dan 41 orang meninggal dunia.https://t.co/2CtfB1pHHg pic.twitter.com/wfjngFCnVI
Our correspondent said that there may have also been a shortage of fireside extinguishers at the scene.
The block housed inmates being held for drug-related offenses and had a capacity for 122 people, she said.
Rika didn’t say what percentage of people were within the facility when the hearth broke out but confirmed the jail was overcrowded.
A fireplace hit the Tangerang Penitentiary in Tangerang City, on Wednesday 8 September 2021 within the early hours of the morning. this hearth left 72 people injured and 41 people dead.
Kompas TV showed footage of firefighters trying to place out huge flames from the highest of a building.
The broadcaster reported 41 people had died and eight had been seriously injured.
“The initial suspicion is that this was due to an electrical short,” police spokesman Yusri Yunus told Metro TV, which cited a police report saying that quite 70 people had suffered injuries.
Those who were injured were taken to 2 hospitals in Tangerang while those that were unharmed were taken to a special facility within the prison complex, consistent with the Beritasatu news website.
The prison in Tangerang, an industrial and manufacturing hub near the capital Jakarta, housed quite 2,000 inmates, much more than its 600 people capacity, consistent with government data as of September.
Al Jazeera’s Washington said overcrowding has been a problem in Indonesian prisons for years.
“Human rights activists have long called to rectify things,” she added, the justice reforms were also being pushed to scale back the overcapacity.
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