Fire leaves 46 dead, dozens injured in southern Taiwan – Times of India

TAIPEI: The death toll from a fire in southern Taiwan that engulfed a building overnight has further risen to 46 killed, according to local officials who said at least another 41 people were injured.
The 13-storey building caught fire around 3am on Thursday, fire officials in the city of Kaohsiung said. A fire department statement said the blaze was “extremely fierce” and destroyed many floors.
At least 11 bodies were sent straight to the morgue, Fire Chief Li Ching-hsiu told reporters at the scene. In Taiwan, official confirmation of a death can only be made in the hospital.
Video shown on Taiwanese television showed orange flames and smoke billowing out of the lower floors of the building as firefighters sprayed water at it from the street. After daybreak, they could be seen spraying water into the middle floors of the still smoldering building from elevated platforms.
The cause of the fire was unclear, but firefighters noted the flames burned most intensely where a lot of clutter had been piled up, the fire department statement said.
Eyewitnesses told Taiwan media that they heard an explosion around 3am.
The building is about 40 years old with shops on the lower levels and apartments above. The lower floors were completely blackened.