Deadliest building collapse of modern times - 24 accused on the run

The Rana Plaza disaster of 2013 in Bangladesh was the deadliest building collapse of modern times, costing the lives of at least 1,138 people. More than 2,000 were injured, and some are still not accounted for.

41 people were charged with murder in connection with the collapse, but now 24 have absconded. A court has issued arrest warrants, and ordered that their property should be seized. The owner of the building, Sohel Rana, is still in custody. The trial is expected to start by April.

The building on the outskirts of Dhaka, originally constructed as a 6-storey shopping mall, had been converted into a 9-floor factory complex. It is alleged that workers drew attention to cracks in the structure before it collapsed.

Bangladesh’s clothing industry employs 4 million people, and makes garments for a number of well-known Western names. (see also my blogs of May 20 and June 12, 2013, and June 1, 2015.)

Rana Plaza collapse - murder charges

The owner of the Rana Plaza factory complex in Bangladesh which collapsed in April 2013 with the loss of more than 1,100 lives has been charged with murder. It was the deadliest event of its kind in modern times.

Sohel Rana and 41 others, including government officials, are accused of ignoring warnings that the buildings, about 20 miles from the capital, Dhaka, were not safe. Any convicted of murder could face the death penalty.

There has been criticism of the length of time it has taken to bring charges, but investigators say they have had to take statements from more than 1,200 people. It is said this is the first time anyone has faced criminal charges over an accident in the country’s clothing industry, which is one of the biggest in the world, and provides cheap items for some well-known Western retailers.

It is alleged that three extra storeys had been illegally added to the building. After the disaster, Mr Rana tried to flee to India. (For more details, see my blog of 3 May 2013.)

Bangladesh war crimes execution

The execution that attracted most attention over the last few days was the killing – apparently by machine gun fire – of Jang Song Thaek, the uncle of North Korea’s young dictator, Kim Jong Un, but there was another of great significance in Bangladesh.

An Islamist leader, Abdul Kader Mullah, was hanged after being found guilty of crimes during Bangladesh’s bloody war of independence in 1971, which cost the lives of up to 3 million people. He was the first person to be executed following conviction by Bangladesh's International Crimes Tribunal.

At his trial, he was described by prosecutors as the ‘Butcher of Mirpur’, a suburb of the capital, Dhaka, where he is alleged to have been involved in the massacre of unarmed civilians and of intellectuals who supported independence from Pakistan. Mullah always denied the charges, and human rights groups have expressed concern about the court’s fairness.

Another 4 members of Mullah’s Jamaat-e-Islami party are also facing the death penalty. His execution has led to clashes in which at least 5 people have died.

Bangladesh - the war goes on

It is more than 40 years since the brutal war of independence that allowed the new nation of Bangladesh to emerge from what had been East Pakistan. In that war, up to three million people died.

Now Bangladesh is torn by riots over the conviction of two leading politicians for collaborating with the Pakistan army to target pro-independence activists during the struggle. The spiritual leader of the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami party, Ghulam Azam, has been sent to gaol for 90 years, while another leading member of the party, Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid, has been sentenced to death.

The verdicts were handed down by the International Crimes Tribunal in Dhaka, set up in 2010 by the current government led by the Awami League. Two people have been killed in riots this week, and 100 so far this year.

Mr Mujahid was a student leader in 1971 who wanted to keep Bangladesh part of Pakistan. His party claims the trials are politically motivated, while Human Rights Watch has described them as "flawed".

Great disasters - great escapes

 

With a death toll of more than 1,120, the fall of the Rana Plaza in Bangladesh is now confirmed as the deadliest building collapse in modern history, but in the midst of terrible tragedy, there was an astonishing story of survival.

Nineteen year old Reshma Begum was pulled from the rubble alive after being trapped for 17 days.  Rescuers had spotted her waving an aluminium curtain rail.   Reshma had come to the big city from the countryside three years ago, and had been working at her factory in the Rana Plaza for less than a month when the block collapsed.  

Three years ago, a 24 year old man was dragged out of the remains of a hotel eleven days after the Haiti earthquake, and 17 days after the collapse of the Sampoong department store in Seoul, South Korea, in 1995, an 18 year old was found alive.

In 1906, nearly 1,100 miners were killed by an explosion in a colliery at Courrieres in France.   To the astonishment of rescue workers, 20 days later, a group of 13 survivors emerged.    They had kept themselves alive on food that miners took down the pit to eat during their breaks and by slaughtering a horse.

*My third video on Britain's 20 Worst Military Disasters is a story from Scotland - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKR5Ayyx6cs

 

Bangladesh factory collapse now deadliest of modern times

The collapse of the Rana Plaza factory building near the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, is now confirmed as the deadliest event of its kind in modern times.    Officials say the death toll has now reached 507, but that scores of people have still not been accounted for. 

About 2,500 people were injured as the 8-storey building fell, and rescuers say they do not know how many are still missing because they have not been able to get accurate figures from the factory owners.  Nine people have been arrested in connection with the disaster.

Ever since the Rana Plaza collapsed last week, workers in Bangladesh’s huge clothing industry have been holding protests to demand better safety standards.

Until now, the deadliest building failure of modern times was the collapse of the Sampoong department store in Seoul, South Korea in 1995, in which 501 people died. When part of the Circus Maximus in Rome collapsed during a gladiator fight some time between 138 and 161AD, it was said to have cost more than 1,100 lives.

*The second in my series of videos on Britain’s 20 Worst Military Disasters – the defeat of Boudicca.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR7U4cjenuQ

Bangladesh building collapse - owner arrested

The owner of the factory building that collapsed last Wednesday in Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, killing hundreds of people, has been arrested by soldiers from the country’s Rapid Action Battalion at the border with India.

Five other people have also been detained - 3 owners of clothes factories that were housed in the Rana Plaza and 2 engineers.   Two more survivors have been pulled from the rubble today, but altogether about 360 people are known to have died.

Police said officials had ordered an evacuation of the block on Tuesday after cracks appeared, but that the factories ignored them, while municipal engineers are reported to have declared the building safe the day before it collapsed. 

Bangladesh has one of the biggest clothing industries in the world, providing cheap products for well-know Western retailers, but it has been widely criticised for low pay and dangerous conditions.     

*  Now available in paperback – Disaster! A History of Earthquakes, Floods, Plagues and Other Catastrophes.  http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/disaster-john-withington/1111579925?ean=9781620871812

It's the poor that gets the disaster

We are used to the idea that it is usually the poor who suffer most from natural disasters.   They tend to live in less sturdy dwellings in more dangerous places, have poorer access to telecommunications for warnings etc

But we have had a reminder this week that they are also more likely to be victims of man-made disasters.   At least 53 people are known to have been killed in a crash between a bus and a lorry about 60 miles north of Zambia’s capital, Lusaka.

The accident happened on a busy road as the bus was reportedly swerving to avoid an oncoming vehicle.    Roads in Zambia are often poorly maintained and vehicles overloaded, but this is believed to have been one of the worst accidents in the country’s history.

Meanwhile in Bangladesh, a ferry capsized on the Meghna River, near the capital, Dhaka, plunging scores of passengers into the water.    Only two bodies have so far been recovered, but up to 40 are still missing.  Ferry accidents are common on the country’s vast river network.    In March last year, more than 112 people drowned when a ferry collided with an oil tanker and sank also in the Meghna.

*My account of the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840’s from A Disastrous History of the World has been reproduced on this website.    http://stravaganzastravaganza.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/the-irish-potato-famine_9376.html#!/2013/01/the-irish-potato-famine_9376.html

Bangladesh factory fire 'sabotage'

Last month’s factory fire on the outskirts of Bangladesh’s capital Dhaka, in which at least 110 people died (see my blog of Nov 25) was caused by sabotage according to an official inquiry.

But the head of the inquiry, Main Uddin Khandaker, added that the owner had been guilty of ‘severe negligence’.  He said factory officials had padlocked exits and prevented workers from escaping.

It is claimed that the factory’s fire certificate was out of date and that the company had permission for only a three-storey building even though it stood nine storeys high.  

The owner of the Tazreen factory has denied the building was unsafe.   It made clothing for a number of well-known retailers.  After the blaze, thousands protested in the streets, demanding higher safety standards.

*A new review of my book Disaster!  http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2012/12/05/disaster-earthquakes-floods-plagues-and-other-catastrophes/

Another deadly factory fire

Last month I blogged about what was perhaps the deadliest factory fire in history in a clothing works in Karachi (see my post of Oct 15).  Now a fire at a clothing factory on the outskirts of Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, is believed to cost more than 112 lives.

The blaze started late on Saturday on the ground floor of the factory, perhaps because of an electrical fault, trapping workers on upper floors.  Some jumped to their deaths from windows.  The building was in a narrow lane, making it hard for fire crews to reach the blaze.

Thousands flocked to the factory looking for relatives who worked there.   A senior fire official said that if there had been a fire escape on the outside of the building, it might have save many lives, while the factory owner said he had never had a fire before at any of his seven premises.

Clothes account for up to 80 per cent of Bangladesh’s exports, and about two million people work in the industry.    Two years ago, another fire in a factory nearby resulted in the deaths of 25 workers.

Bangladesh flood

After some of the heaviest rain Bangladesh has suffered in years, floods and landslides have killed at least 70 people, and left another 200,000 homeless.     Eighteen inches of rain are said to have fallen in the port of Chittagong in just 24 hours.

At least 15 people died there, while another 30 perished in Bandarban to the south-east.  The authorities fear more people may be trapped under mud, and rescue efforts are continuing to find and free them.

In Sylhet in the north-east of the country, house roofs are three feet beneath the water, and local people have had to scramble up onto high ground, or take refuge in boats.   Districts around the capital, Dhaka, have also been inundated.

A monsoon flood in Bangladesh is said to have killed nearly 29,000 in 1974, though some of these may have perished in the famine that followed.    It happened less than four years after the deadliest cyclone in history killed perhaps half a million of its people. 

Bangladesh's worst fire

The fire that swept through a densely populated area of Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, is the worst to have hit the country since it became independent in 1971. At least 120 people have been killed in the ancient buildings and narrow alleys of the Kayettuli district.

It is believed that an electrical transformer exploded after heavy rain, and that the fire was then fuelled by chemicals stored in illicit improvised factories in the area. Flames were said to have leapt six storeys high.

The authorities say that many buildings did not have proper fire escapes, that fire engines could not get down the narrow streets and that there were no hydrants for firemen to get water to fight the flames. Some victims were taken to hospital in rickshaws by local people.

Only on Tuesday, a five storey building collapsed in Dhaka, killing at least 25 people as it crashed down on slums below. The structure had been built on swampy ground, and police say it had then been modified without approval from the authorities.

Road accidents - Bangladesh

Another country with dangerous roads is Bangladesh. On New Year’s Day, at least 18 people were killed when a bus skidded off the road and plunged into a ditch in dense fog at Kanaipur in the south-west of the country.

Early last month, near the same town, at least 20 people died when two buses collided head-on, and in December 2008, 24 perished when the lorry in which they were travelling veered off the road, again in thick fog. The accident happened at Tangail, about 40 miles north of the capital Dhaka.

Altogether, up to 5,000 people are killed every year in road accidents in Bangladesh. Poor roads and old, badly maintained vehicles are blamed for most crashes.

The Inter-American Development Bank once named the North Yungas Road, a 40 mile highway in Bolivia that leads from La Paz to Coroico, “the world’s most dangerous”. Also known as the “Road of Death”, it is said to see up to 300 travellers killed every year. (See also my blogs of Dec 20 and 29)