As many as 200 people may have been living in the building, witnesses said, including in the basement, which should have been used as a parking garage.
A firefighter carries a person from the building to an ambulance at the scene of a fire in Johannesburg on Aug. 31, 2023. | Michele Spatari/AFP/Getty ImagesJOHANNESBURG — A nighttime fire ripped through a rundown five-story building in Johannesburg that was occupied by homeless people and squatters, leaving at least 73 people dead early Thursday, emergency services in South Africa’s biggest city said.
City officials said 141 families were affected by the tragedy but could not say exactly how many people were in the building when the fire started. Many of the people inside were foreign nationals, the officials said. “This is a tragedy for Johannesburg. Over 20 years in the service, I’ve never come across something like this,” Mulaudzi said.
Johannesburg is rated as Africa’s richest city but its center is rundown and often neglected. Abandoned and broken-down buildings are common, and people desperate for some form of accommodation often take them over. City authorities refer to the structures as “hijacked buildings.” Speaking at the scene, Gauteng province’s police commissioner, Lt. Gen. Elias Mawela said police were aware of approximately 700 buildings in central Johannesburg that were derelict and abandoned by their official owners. He urged city authorities to act.
Search teams found 73 bodies. The chance of anyone else being found alive hours after the fire broke out was “very slim,” he said.
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