MEGACITY DIARIES: THE CURIOUS CASE OF FIRES

A fireball erupts seconds after the Green Line Bus makes a close pass at Surjani. Some microseconds later, a flying LPG cylinder narrowly misses the motorcyclist by a few inches. They are seen scrambling with the motorbike to safety.

The 24-second video of the incident made a viral round on social media and mainstream news. In a media-sphere of sharing content of a destructive scale hides a startling fact concerning Karachi’s fire safety standards.

In the year 2022, there were more than 2000 fire-related incidents reported across the seven districts. More than 150 incidents were reported from districts South, Central, East and Korangi. Safety experts attribute the steep rise in incidents to the risky storage of flammable materials, unsafe LPG cylinders and a severe lack of implementation of the building codes for fire safety (2016).

“Incidental fires are unsolicited disasters that claim not only billions worth property but precious human lives as well,” says Tariq Moeen, director of the Fire Protection Association of Pakistan (FPAP). An absence of a general culture that weighs importance on implementing standard codes concerning safety has been a historical problem concerning Karachi’s city planning and governance. With population densities reaching as high as 100,000 persons/sq.km and a rapid rise of hi-rise buildings for residential and commercial structures has in proportion raised the risks for fire-related incidents. In fact, the risk increases specifically in informal housing sectors where residential and commercial operations mix.

To save on costs, warehousing in such locations has long been a dominant practice. While they are advertised as avenues for a lifestyle bliss and great investment opportunities, most projects do not have fire protection or safety codes implemented. Commenting on the situation, Tariq adds, “although unified fire safety arrangements have been specified in the Building Code of Pakistan (BCP) Fire Safety Provisions 2016, apart from multinationals and some local responsible industries, the level of seriousness given for its implementation by authorities and the management of industrial and commercial concerns, continues to be the main cause for fire incidents and losses.”

With a cultural trend to ignore advisories, the practice is to place responsibility and trust in a supernatural entity – against the evidence-based approach that shows that timely interventions prevent unrecoverable costs. Due to National Fire Safety Measures implemented in the EU, the number of fire victims have fallen significantly. Between 1982-2012, France witnessed a drop of 48% while the UK saw a drop of 56%. In an unregulated ecosystem, it does open a hard question: do we not love ourselves to make the necessary shift in attitudes and behaviors towards personal safety as well as those of our loved ones?

At the 12th Fire Safety & Security Convention-2022, a tacit admittance was shared – that governance regimes are unable to implement the safety regulations concerning safety but more so, the rapidness at which the high-rise projects receive approvals despite undocumented procedures to deploy safety equipment goes unnoticed. At the convention, the Sindh governor, Kamran Tessori advised citizens to adopt fire prevention measures despite the high costs of investments and prevent losses of a higher nature – including the loss of life. “The frequency of recent fires suggests that there is a need to raise awareness among the masses”, stated the governor.

More importantly the general attitudes towards ensuring the protection of families and children as well as preventing losses for small and medium businesses is not absent, but rather inaccessible. Some say the investment costs are too high while others subvert the rules for personal gain. In parallel, aging electrical infrastructure and a growing use of high-powered appliances within homes and other commercial centers that use incorrect wire gauge number is a growing cause for electrical fires. The popular case of the three-day fire at a famous supermarket chain near the Karachi Central Prison is a case (among several) that drives the point home. The underground parking was illegally converted to a warehouse where highly flammable materials were stored with inadequate fire safety equipment as well as non-existent emergency procedures to deal with any untoward incidence. Many experts raise a valid question, who was the electrical inspector who provided the certifications for such premises?

In a haphazard, ad-hoc method to urbanizing the megacity, has laid bare a serious question about strict enforcement of fire safety codes – along with other safety standards. Despite a declaration in the Sindh High Court that task forces have been formed at sub-divisional, divisional and district levels and whose job it is to inspect buildings and factories and ensure that they adhere to the prescribed fire prevention codes, the recent spate in fires however tell a different story as well as the improper documentation of a duly filed root-cause-analysis set of reports. The city’s former chief, Mubin Ahmed, frames it in the following way, “Unlike different kinds of crises, where harm/s caused are static in nature, fire is a dynamic element and if left un-handled, a little fire might change over to a major disaster. Therefore, a standby fire intervention for fire administration and services activates and that complements precautionary and preventative measures at the local town level. As of now, Karachi’s fire services are limping with acute shortages.”

The shortages in question revolve around manpower, vehicles, equipment, and fire stations alongside standby hydrants to cater to Karachi’s dense infrastructure and population. According to the fire chief’s assessment on Karachi’s fire defense needs, a deficit of 178 stations exists compared to the existing 22. Similarly, 440 fires attending vehicles are required against the 40 available today and a manpower of 8000 is needed compared to 2000 available at hand.

“With the above huge deficiencies of fire intervention resources in terms of Fire Stations, extraordinary efforts are required to fill the gap for appliances/vehicles and operational manpower. Moreover, as the scale of authorization of various components has been suggested by the authorities concerned either on area-based or population-based sliding scale, the growth of Fire Service should also be considered along with the exponential growth of urban areas and population as per the census observations carried out by the Government of Pakistan,” remarked Mubin.

Ahmad Aziz is a freelance contributor