Fire kills 112 workers at Bangladesh garment-maker

Bangladeshi army sol­diers carry the bod­ies of work­ers killed in a fire at a gar­ment fac­tory out­side Dhaka, Bangladesh, Sun­day. At least 112 peo­ple were killed in a late Sat­ur­day night fire that raced through the multi-story gar­ment fac­tory just out­side of Bangladesh’s cap­i­tal, an offi­cial said Sun­day. (Asso­ci­ated Press | Jibon Amir)

JULHAS ALAM

Asso­ci­ated Press

DHAKA, Bangladesh — Fire raced up the floors of a gar­ment fac­tory in Bangladesh, killing at least 112 peo­ple, many of them trapped in the eight-story build­ing with no emer­gency exits where they make clothes for major global retailers.

The fac­tory out­side the cap­i­tal, Dhaka, is owned by Tazreen Fash­ions Ltd., a sub­sidiary of the Tuba Group, which makes prod­ucts for Wal-Mart and other com­pa­nies in the U.S. and Europe.

Fire­fight­ers recov­ered at least 100 bod­ies from the fac­tory and 12 more peo­ple died at hos­pi­tals after jump­ing from the build­ing to escape, Maj. Moham­mad Mah­bub, fire depart­ment oper­a­tions direc­tor, told The Asso­ci­ated Press on Sunday.

Local media reported that up to 124 peo­ple were killed. The cause of the blaze that began late Sat­ur­day was not imme­di­ately clear, and author­i­ties ordered an investigation.

Army sol­diers and bor­der guards were help­ing keep order as thou­sands of onlook­ers and anx­ious rel­a­tives of the fac­tory work­ers gath­ered, Mah­bub said.

Tazreen was given a “high risk” safety rat­ing after a May 16, 2011, audit con­ducted by an “eth­i­cal sourc­ing” asses­sor for Wal-Mart, accord­ing to a doc­u­ment posted on the Tuba Group’s web­site. It did not spec­ify what led to the rating.

Wal-Mart spokesman Kevin Gard­ner said online doc­u­ments indi­cat­ing an orange or “high risk” assess­ment after the May 2011 inspec­tion and a yel­low or “medium risk” report after an inspec­tion in August 2011 appeared to per­tain to the fac­tory. The August 2011 let­ter said Wal-Mart would con­duct another inspec­tion within one year.

Gard­ner said it was not clear if that inspec­tion had been con­ducted or whether the fac­tory was still mak­ing prod­ucts for Wal-Mart.

If a fac­tory is rated “orange” three times in two years, Wal-Mart won’t place any orders for one year. The May 2011 report was the first orange rat­ing for the factory.

Nei­ther Tazreen’s owner nor Tuba Group offi­cials could be reached for comment.

The Tuba Group is a major Bangladeshi gar­ment exporter whose clients also include Car­refour and IKEA, accord­ing to its web­site. Its fac­to­ries export gar­ments to the U.S., Ger­many, France, Italy and the Nether­lands, among other coun­tries. The Tazreen fac­tory, which opened in 2009 and employed about 1,700 peo­ple, made polo shirts, fleece jack­ets and T-shirts.

Bangladesh has some 4,000 gar­ment fac­to­ries, many with­out proper safety mea­sures. The coun­try annu­ally earns about $20 bil­lion from exports of gar­ment prod­ucts, mainly to the U.S. and Europe.

In its 2012 Global Respon­si­bil­ity report, Wal-Mart said that “fire safety con­tin­ues to be a key focus for brands and retail­ers sourc­ing from Bangladesh.” Wal-Mart said it ceased work­ing with 49 fac­to­ries in Bangladesh in 2011 because of fire safety issues, and was work­ing with its sup­plier fac­to­ries to phase out pro­duc­tion from build­ings deemed high risk.

At the fac­tory, rel­a­tives of the work­ers fran­ti­cally looked for their loved ones. Sabina Yas­mine said she saw the body of her daughter-in-law, but had seen no trace of her son, who also worked there.

“Oh, Allah, where’s my soul? Where’s my son?” wailed Yas­mine, who works at another fac­tory in the area. “I want the fac­tory owner to be hanged. For him, many have died, many have gone.”

Mah­bub said the fire broke out on the ground floor, which was used as a ware­house, and spread quickly to the upper floors. Many work­ers who retreated to the roof were res­cued, he said. But he said that with no emer­gency exits lead­ing out­side the build­ing, many vic­tims were trapped, and fire­fight­ers recov­ered 69 bod­ies from the sec­ond floor alone.

“The fac­tory had three stair­cases, and all of them were down through the ground floor,” Mah­bub said. “So the work­ers could not come out when the fire engulfed the building.”

“Had there been at least one emer­gency exit through out­side the fac­tory, the casu­al­ties would have been much lower,” he said.

Many vic­tims were burned beyond recog­ni­tion. The bod­ies were laid out in rows at a school nearby. Many of them were handed over to fam­i­lies; unclaimed vic­tims were taken to Dhaka Med­ical Col­lege for identification.

Prime Min­is­ter Sheikh Hasina expressed shock at the loss of so many lives.

The Bangladesh Gar­ment Man­u­fac­tur­ers and Exporters Asso­ci­a­tion said it would stand by the vic­tims’ families.

Posted by AP News on Nov 25 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.