At least 18 children died when a fire ripped through the dormitory of their boarding school north of the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, officials said on Friday, and there were concerns that the death toll could rise.
The cause of the fire on Thursday night is not yet known, but the deadly blaze at the Hillside Endarasha Primary School in Nyeri County brought renewed attention to safety concerns in Kenyan education, particularly in boarding schools.
There were 311 children at the boarding school at the time of the fire, with at least 70 children still unaccounted for, said Rigathi Gachagua, Kenya’s deputy president, but he urged people not to draw any conclusions.
“That does not mean that they have perished or they are injured. The word is that they are unaccounted for,” he said, after arriving at the school. He added that “some parents came and took away their children” without telling the authorities.
The authorities reached the scene around 3 a.m. to find the that the boys’ dormitory was on fire, said Pius Mugambi Murugu, the region’s acting commissioner.
By the morning, the fire had been contained, and the authorities were working with the Kenyan Red Cross to reunite parents with their children.
Twenty-seven children have been hospitalized, some have been taken in by residents of the surrounding towns while waiting for their parents to arrive, and others simply fled.
Sixteen children were burned beyond recognition, and one died while being taken to a hospital, according to Resila Onyango, the spokeswoman for the national police. One child died at the hospital, Mr. Gachagua said later, bringing the total to 18.
Many parents must now wait for DNA analysis to identify the victims, while hoping for word that their children were among those who were able to make it out of the compound.
Among the anxious parents was Collins Muriithi Wachira, who had been assigned a counselor while he waited for news about his 9-year-old son, Charles.
“I have no strength. I am afraid of what could have happened to my child,” he said in a telephone interview. “I am still hoping he could be somewhere in the neighborhood.”
Mr. Wachira’s father, Muriithi Rukwaro, called him when the fire broke out. Mr. Rukwaro, a local priest, headed to the scene and helped other families while awaiting news about his grandson.
“Everyone is grieving, including those who were lucky to have found their children safe,” he said. “It’s all our loss — there is nothing we can do now.”
Samson Mwangi, who had two children at the school, said in a telephone interview that he had heard of the fire in a call around 11 p.m. on Thursday from his sister, who lived nearby.
She went to the school immediately to look for his two children, a 14-year-old boy and an 8-year-old girl, and Mr. Mwangi joined her as soon as he could.
He drove for more than three hours from his home in Nairobi, navigating thick mist and muddy roads that complicated the efforts of rescuers to reach the scene.
His son and daughter survived, he said, thanks in part to people who lived near the school. Hundreds had risked their lives to rescue children, said Mr. Mwangi.
“They managed to save some of the children, many of whom were hiding under the beds when the fire broke out,” he said.
By the time firefighters arrived, the fire had already done much of its worst, he added.
“This is devastating news,” President William Ruto said on social media. “Those responsible will be held to account.” He declared three days of national mourning, during which flags will fly at half-mast.
Kenya has a legacy of boarding schools dating to the country’s colonial period, when they were one of the few options for older students to continue their education. They are now more widespread and available to a broader range of students.
But there have been long-running concerns about the safety record of boarding schools in Kenya. The government appointed a task force in late 2016 in response to a series of arson attacks related to student unrest.
The report placed blame for the attacks on drug abuse, religious tensions and a breakdown in the relationship between teachers and students. It also laid out a set of requirements intended to prevent overcrowding and raise building standards.
A 2020 audit found that most schools were ill-prepared for a fire emergency, lacking working extinguishers and alarms, despite a detailed national safety manual published in 2008.
Kenya’s deadliest school fire was in 2001, when students set fire to a high school in Machakos, southeast of Nairobi, killing 67 students, according to the 2016 report.
In 2017, just weeks after the investigation, 10 students died in a fire at a prestigious girls’ school in Nairobi. More recently, in 2021, nearly 60 children were hospitalized after a fire at a girls’ high school in Nairobi.
Mr. Gachagua, Mr. Ruto’s deputy, urged schools on Friday to enforce safety and security measures in order to “avert such incidences.”
But Philip Zeal Chebunet, a lecturer at University of Eldoret in Kenya, said that handbooks of regulations were not enough.
“Most of our institutions are poorly designed to handle disaster,” he said. “The equipment is lacking and training is wanting. The bureaucracy does not help.”
The post Fire at School Dormitory in Kenya Kills at Least 18 Children appeared first on New York Times.