Six members of two families, including children, were killed and several other injured in a devastating fire that broke out in the early hours of Friday at a residential building in the capital’s Uttara.
The blaze occurred on the second floor of the seven-storey building on Road 18 in Sector 11 of Uttara.
According to Fire Service, 13 people were rescued from the building and taken to nearby hospitals following the incident.
Rafiqul Ahmed, the officer-in-charge of Uttara West Police Station, said preliminary findings suggest the fire originated in the kitchen on the second floor.
“We initially believe the fire may have been caused by a gas connection or an electrical short circuit,” the officer added.
Meanwhile, another fire broke out at a four-storey building in Jigatola later the same afternoon, though no casualties were reported in that incident.
Those killed in the Uttara fire include three members of the same family – Kazi Fazle Rabbi, 38; his wife Afroza Akhtar Subarna, 37; and their two-year-old son, Kazi Faiyaz Rishan.
The other victims were Md Haris Uddin, 52; his 17-year-old son, Md Rahab; and Haris’s niece, 14-year-old Rodela Akhtar.
Fire Service officials say the fire broke out at around 7:50am. After receiving the alert, fire service units reached the scene by 7:58am. Two units from the Uttara Fire Station brought the blaze under control within about half an hour.
By around 10am, the fire was fully extinguished. Shortly after the fire broke out. A large quantity of furniture inside the flat caused the fire to spread rapidly, contributing to the high number of casualties.
Afrin, sister of the deceased Afroza, said Fazle Rabbi’s village home is in the Nanuya Dighirpar area of Cumilla Sadar upazila. He was employed at SK+F Pharmaceuticals, while his wife Afroza Akhtar worked as a senior executive at Square Pharmaceuticals. The couple had two sons, Faiyaz and Rafsan.
As both parents were working professionals, Afrin said, the two children usually stayed at their maternal grandmother’s home in Uttara.
“Since offices were closed on Friday, Afroza brought the younger child back to their own flat from her mother’s house the night before,” she said.
Afrin added that Afroza was taken to the emergency department of the National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery, where doctors declared her dead. The bodies of the other two family members were taken to Kuwait Maitree Hospital.
“All of them died after falling seriously ill from smoke inhalation,” she said. “There were no burn injuries on their bodies.”
Shawon Bin Rahman, a residential surgeon at the National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery, said Afroza was brought to the hospital dead. “There were no burn injuries on her body. We believe she died after falling seriously ill from smoke inhalation,” he said.
The other family affected by the tragedy has its ancestral home in Ishwarganj upazila of Mymensingh.
Of the victims from that family, the bodies of Haris Uddin and his son Rahab have been kept at Mansur Ali Medical College Hospital, while the body of Rodela Akhtar has been placed at Lubna General Hospital and Cardiac Centre.
Police said all the bodies were handed over to the families without post-mortem examinations after identification.
Although the fire did not spread directly to the upper floors, dense smoke trapped residents on the fifth and sixth floors, leading to fatalities.
Shiblu, a survivor of the fire, said he was sleeping on the fourth floor of the affected building with his wife and two children when the blaze broke out. He woke up to the sound of glass shattering “like rainfall” from the upper floor but did not immediately realise that a fire had started.
When he tried to escape with his family, they were trapped by thick smoke. With no other option, they shut the door and waited inside the flat. After some time, fire service personnel rescued them and helped the family out of the building safely, he said.
Eyewitnesses said the heavy smoke prevented residents from moving either downstairs or upwards to escape. One resident said, “The smoke spread very quickly, leaving people trapped.”
Another eyewitness, Sumi Alam, said the condition inside the building remains hazardous. “Black burn marks are visible from the second floor upwards, and it is still unsafe to enter the building,” she said.
Police said the funeral prayers for several of the deceased held last afternoon at the Uttara Boro Mosque.
Jigatola building fire
Another fire broke out at a residential building in Jigatola, prompting the deployment of two fire service units to extinguish the blaze.
According to fire service officials, the fire started after 2:30pm on Friday and was brought under control by around 3pm.
Fire Service warehouse inspector Md Anwarul Islam said the fire broke out on the third floor of a four-storey residential building on New Road in Jigatola at around 2:36pm.
He said two units of the Fire Service and Civil Defence reached the scene within 14 minutes and managed to bring the fire under control.
No casualties were reported in the Jigatola incident.
