11 die in fire at home for people on welfare in Sapporo
February 1, 2018
Sapporo- Eleven people have died in a fire at a residential facility mainly for those on welfare in Sapporo, the capital of the northernmost Japan prefecture of Hokkaido.
Around 11:40 p.m. Wednesday (2:40 p.m. GMT), a passerby made an emergency call to fire authorities reporting the blaze.
The fire was brought under control around 5:15 a.m. Thursday after destroying the two-story wooden building with a total floor space of about 400 square meters, and the bodies of 11 people believed to be residents of the facility were discovered at the site.
The facility, aimed at helping people on welfare become financially independent, had a total of 16 residents, including elderly people, according to the Hokkaido police department and the Sapporo fire department.
The police are working to identify the 11 victims--eight men and three women--and investigating the cause of the fire.
The five other residents survived the fire. Three of them were sent to hospital and are not in life-threatening condition. The other two were unhurt.
The building is believed to have been constructed more than 50 years ago.
According to officials of the municipal fire department, there was no obligation for the building to have sprinklers. No violations of relevant legislation were found in an on-site inspection of the building conducted in December 2016, the officials said.
The facility, formerly used as a hotel, had five private rooms, as well as a kitchen and a dining space on the first floor and 13 rooms on the second floor, they said.
According to the police, two staff officials from the entity that operated the facility were there in the daytime of Wednesday, but none at night.
The facility was in a residential area about one kilometer north of Sapporo Station of Hokkaido Railway Co., or JR Hokkaido.
In talks with reporters, Noriyoshi Fujimoto, 68, head of the operator, said that he is "very sorry" to the residents, in their 40s to 80s.
Staff workers usually stayed at the facility from around 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. each day. Residents were in charge of locking the building at 8 p.m., said Fujimoto, who has continued supporting homeless and needy people.
Each resident had a kerosene stove for heating in his or her room, Fujimoto said, adding that he had advised residents to take care to prevent fires from occurring.
Fujimoto, who lives near the facility, rushed to the site immediately after the fire broke out. But he said that he could not enter the building due to a huge blaze and thick smoke.
Shun Nakayama, a 26-year-old student, saw the fire on his way home. "I didn't hear an explosion, but I heard a sound like wood burning," Nakayama said, adding, "The blaze became more powerful although water was pumped into the building."
Meanwhile, a 67-year-old woman said, "I heard explosions many times as kerosene containers (at the facility) caught fire." Jiji Press
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