The blaze was first noticed at around 12:30 a.m. in block A of the 17-storey My Dinh 1 apartment complex in Tu Liem District.
It took firefighters over half an hour to put it out.
No injuries were reported.
“It was around midnight when I sensed the smell of something burning,” said Tran Kim Ngoc who lives in apartment 1308, the first resident to become aware of the fire.
“Smoke was coming out of the basement when I came down to the first floor.”
Ngoc said he and others then rushed to other floors to tell people to flee.
Another resident, Vo Thanh Hai, was reportedly the first to rush to the basement with a fire extinguisher.
“After failing to put out the fire, I had to escape to avoid asphyxiation,” he said.
“I saw the fire spreading from a BMW car parked there.”
He slammed the slow reaction of the building guards, who failed to detect the fire immediately.
Captain Nguyen Thanh Vinh, deputy chief of the Tu Liem District fire department, said the basement had no automatic fire extinguishing system and the pressure in the water hoses was too weak.
“The basement does not have easy access. We had to break windows to control the fire.”
A resident, Nguyen Hong Quan, said there had been two drums containing nearly 400 liters of kerosene in the basement.
Ba Dinh Investment and Construction General Company, which built and maintains the apartment blocks, said Wednesday it would pay damages to affected people.
It also agreed to provide VND100,000 (US$6) per day for each family for a week’s temporary lodging when it would repair damaged apartments.
There are 128 families who have resided in the apartments since July last year.
But the fire extinguishing system and a road inside the apartment complex are yet to be completed.
In related news, another blaze Wednesday morning destroyed a cassava store at Bien Hoa Sugar Company in Dong Nai Province.
The loss for the company situated in Bien Hoa Industrial Zone No. 1 is estimated at around VND15 billion ($890,000).
Seventy firefighters and 10 fire engines were mobilized but the fire could only be put out at 11:00 a.m., nine hours after it began.
A company official, Nguyen Cong Khanh, said the 2,500-square-meter store was rented by another company, Proconco Company, which had stored over 4,700 tons of dry cassava.
The cause of the fire is yet to be pinpointed, the police said, adding they would continue investigations.
Reported by Thanh Nien staff |
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