Roundup: Fire in Kenya Kills 58 School Boys

Fire early Monday killed 58 boys and injured 28, when they were asleep in a dorm at a school some 64 Kilometers southeast of Kenya's capital Nairobi, ringing alarming bells to teachers and politicians across the country.

"It is the worst scene I had ever seen," said Francis Ngunga, an English teacher of the secondary school, when showing the Xinhua reporter around the scene, where the twisted bodies were huddled and piled at the doorway.

About 139 boys aged between 15 and 17 were sleeping in the dorm when the fire broke out at about 1:40 a.m. on Monday (2240GMT on Sunday), said the teacher of the Kyanguli mixed secondary school in Machakos District.

The rescuers were still ploughing the debris in a frantic way, when the reporter reached there, in the hope of finding more survivors.

"I was awakened by sharp yells and saw flame and smoke filling the whole room. I jumped up from the bed and was lucky to flee out through the front door," said Kennedy Muema, who managed a narrow escape in the disaster.

It's reported that one door of the dorm was locked when the fire broke out, reinforcing the police's suspicion of a plotted arson. Police criminal investigation had been called in, said Julius Narangui, police chief of the district.

The Ministry of Education, in liaison with the Office of the President, will start a thorough investigation in this accident, vowed Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi, when inspecting the scene and coordinating the rescue work in Monday afternoon.

The president observed that there are negligence and carelessness in most boarding secondary schools across the country, where escape routes are often not provided in dormitories.

Education inspectors at all levels must work to see that all school dormitories have sufficient escape routes, which should be easily accessible and big enough for easier exit, said the president.

In 1998, a similar dormitory fire killed more than 22 school girls at a school near Mombasa, an Indian Ocean port city in southeastern Kenya.

It is reported that some badly burnt students have been admitted to Nairobi's Kenyatta Hospital for emergency treatment.






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