At least 17 children have died and 70 are missing after a fire ripped through the dormitory of their primary school in central Kenya overnight, Kenyan authorities said Friday. The fire at Hillside Endarasha Academy in Nyeri County broke out around midnight on Thursday, police said, adding that the average age of the victims was about nine.
The school, which has some 800 pupils aged between five and 12, is located in a semi-rural area about 170km north of the capital Nairobi. “There are 17 dead” and several others who were injured, 16 of them seriously, and rushed to hospital, police spokesperson Resila Onyango said, adding that an investigation is underway to determine the cause of the fire. “The bodies found at the scene were burned beyond recognition.”she added. “More bodies will probably be found” during the inspection of the premises, according to her.
Later in the afternoon, Kenyan Vice President Rigathi Gachagua announced that 70 children were still missing. “We still have 70 children who have not been found, which does not mean that they are dead or injured. The fact is that we have not found them.”Rigathi Gachagua told reporters outside the school where the fire broke out. About a hundred parents were gathered outside the school on Friday, anxiously waiting for news of their children.
“Little information”
“We have had little information. They tell us that some children were able to escape, but we are not told where.”Francis Wachira, 33, who has a daughter who attends the school, told AFP. “The longer I wait here, the more my hope of seeing my child again diminishes…”he confided. Some children have taken refuge in nearby houses, said Kenyan Interior Minister Kithure Kindiki, who visited the site on Friday. Those “are alive and well, but of course traumatized, and still with those who welcomed them into their homes last night”he added.
Survivors, wrapped in blue blankets to protect themselves from the cold, were taken away in buses, AFP reported. Elisabeth Nyambura, a 35-year-old mother, said her 13-year-old son had been found and taken home. The mother stayed behind to help find one of his friends. “He (his son) just told me they saw smoke and ran out the window. I’m just really happy he’s alive.”she said. The dormitory’s frame was burned, and its corrugated iron roof completely collapsed, AFP found. The building was sealed with yellow tape by police, who sealed off all its access points.
“Overcrowded” dormitory
According to the Kenyan Commission on Gender and Equality, which is calling for a full investigation into the incident, initial reports indicate that the dormitory was “overcrowded, in violation of safety regulations”. Evoking a “devastating news”Kenyan President William Ruto, currently in Beijing for a China-Africa summit, expressed his condolences. “Our thoughts are with the families of the children who lost their lives.” in this “tragedy”he said in a message on X. William Ruto added that he had asked officials to “to conduct a thorough investigation into this horrific incident” and promised that those responsible would be “held to account”.
The Kenya Red Cross said it had deployed teams on the ground to provide “psychosocial support services for students, teachers and affected families”. “Heartbreaking news from Kenya, where school fire has caused devastation”reacted on X Jagan Chapagain, secretary general of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). “Our thoughts are with all those affected”.
There have been numerous school fires in the past in Kenya and across East Africa. In 2016, nine students were killed in a fire at a girls’ high school in Kibera, Nairobi’s largest slum. In 2001, 67 students were killed in an arson attack on their dormitory at a secondary school in Machakos District, southern Kenya. Two students were charged with the murder, and the school’s headmaster and deputy headmaster were found guilty of negligence. In 1994, 40 students burned alive and 47 were injured in a fire that tore through a girls’ secondary school in the Kilimanjaro region of northern neighboring Tanzania.
