A lighter factory in Sambirejo village in the Binjai sub-district of Langkat Regency of North Sumatra was destroyed in a fire today. Various reports stated that a loud explosion was heard before the fire started around noon.
It took approximately two hours for firefighters to extinguish the blaze.
“We found 24 victims during our initial search. After all of our officers conducted a thorough search at the scene, the death toll has reached 30. There are three children among the victims, and the rest are adults,” Regional Disaster Management Agency (BPBD) Langkat Chief Irwan Syahri said today, as quoted by Kumparan.
Preliminary reports say all of the factory workers died in the fire except for two, who were in the kitchen at the time.
State news agency Antara reported that the victims were all women who were workers locked inside the factory when it went up in flames. A witness said the fire quickly spread due to the abundance of flammable objects inside the factory.
A former worker at the factory told Tribun that the factory’s doors are usually locked during working hours by the factory foreman to prevent stealing by employees.
Irwan said the bodies have all been sent to a hospital in the North Sumatra capital of Medan.
As of the time of writing, the cause of the fire has not yet been determined.
