Sri Lankan killed in major fire in Bangladesh

At least 19 people, including a Sri Lankan citizen, were killed and 70 others injured in a fire that broke out at FR Tower in Dhaka?s Banani area in Bangladesh this afternoon.

The fire broke out on the eighth floor of the 22-storey building on Banani Road 17 around 1:00pm and engulfed other floors immediately. The cause of the fire could not be known immediately, the Daily Star reported.

Of those killed was Niras Chandra, a Sri Lankan national. He reportedly fell to his death while escaping the fire. Niras was brought dead to Kurmitola General Hospital, said the hospital?s Director Brig Gen Qazi Rashid-Un-Nabi.

He sustained serious injuries as he jumped off the building to escape the fire and died before he was admitted to hospital.

The Banani fire incident, that has claimed 19 lives, comes barely a month after a devastating fire ripped through Old Dhaka?s Chawkbazar area on February 20, leaving 71 people dead.

The Chawkbazar fire, which sparked from a chemical warehouse, is the second deadliest chemical-fuelled fire in the country after the 2010 Nimtoli incident.

Fire incidents at the city?s burgeoning skyscrapers are nothing new. Cramped buildings, narrow alleyways, lack of fire security kits, inadequate fire exits in the skyscrapers are often considered a recipe of disasters. (Colombo Gazette)