Watch: Dozens killed as massive fire rips through shopping mall in eastern Iraq
Laura Sharman, Aqeel Najim
and
Teele Rebane
, CNN
https://players.brightcove.net/6093072280001/default_default/index.html?videoId=6375742528112
A huge fire has torn through a commercial building in Iraq's eastern city of Kut, killing dozens of people, according to local authorities.
About 50 men, women and children died in the overnight blaze on Wednesday (local time), according to Wasit regional governor Mohammed Jameel Al-Mayahi. Local media reports identified the location as the Kut Hypermarket mall.
Video footage shared on Facebook and geolocated by CNN showed a large multistory building in Kut engulfed by flames, with a group of people gathered on the rooftop as firefighters battled the blaze. People were seen calmly filing out of the building, as flames raged directly overhead, in another video posted to X.
Crowds gathered in a fenced area outside an unconfirmed location during daylight hours, with emergency vehicles parked nearby, photos posted on Telegram showed.
Al-Mayahi, the region's governor, has declared three days of mourning for the victims of the fire.
The cause of the fire is not immediately known, but initial results from an investigation will be released within 48 hours, Al-Mayahi said in a post on Facebook. A legal case has been filed against the building owner, he added.
Iraq has witnessed similar deadly incidents in the past, often attributed to a lack of adherence to civil defence regulations, poor safety measures and electrical short circuits.
In April 2021, a fire at Ibn al-Khatib Hospital in Baghdad claimed the lives of more than 80 patients in a Covid-19 isolation ward when oxygen tanks exploded.
In September 2023, a fire ripped through a wedding hall in Qaraqosh in northern Iraq, killing at least 100 and injuring 150 others.
- CNN
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
RNZ News
a day ago
- RNZ News
Coroner rules newborn found dead alongside mum killed by sepsis, smothering, or both
Emerald Tai. Photo: Supplied / Givealittle A coroner has not been able to find with certainty what caused the death of a newborn boy who was found after sleeping alongside his mother, who also died . Police at the time called the deaths "an absolute tragedy" . Tanatui Samuels was born at Auckland Hospital on 13 March, 2020. Three days later he was dead. He was the son of Emerald Tai and her partner Tana-Tui. Baby Tanatui was born at 38 weeks after Tai went to hospital in the late stages of labour. He was healthy, but needed to be put under observation because meconium was found in the in-utero fluid during delivery. Meconium is the baby's first stool which a baby normally passes in the first few days after birth. It can cause serious health issues, including infection, if it's found while a baby is still in the womb. In a finding released on Wednesday, the coroner Woolley said Tai, 27, asked to be discharged from hospital at about 6pm the next day so she and her baby could go home. But hospital staff told her she should stay under observation for at least a day after the birth. She was at high risk of post-partum bleeding because of a fast labour, was anaemic, had a history of bleeding and had five more earlier births. Tai also had low blood pressure coupled with a high heart rate, the coroner noted. Hospital staff also advised that baby Tanatui should stay for a full 48 hours because of his exposure to meconium. Tai signed a "discharge against medical advice" form and was told to monitor her baby for increased temperature or efforts in breathing. She was also given a pēpi pod. Tai had not updated her address to Kelston on hospital records, which contained an old address in Blockhouse Bay. The day after the pair went home a midwife said she would visit that day but went to the incorrect Blockhouse Bay home. She knocked on the door twice and rang Tai, but she did not answer. The midwife made a note for the duty midwife to visit the next day. But that night Tai complained of pain in her stomach, her back, hips and buttocks and also said she was feeling hot. She and baby Tanatui went to sleep on the couch in the lounge. At about 10am the next day, her partner went to check on them and found them both cold and unresponsive. The coroner's report said a forensic pathologist found she died from puerperal sepsis. It's also known as postpartum sepsis - a bacterial infection in the genital tract within 10 days of birth, miscarriage or abortion. The coroner said this used to be very common and that many women died from it. In modern times, it was thought about 1 to 3 percent of women having babies were affected by it. When the health and disability commissioner [HDC] investigated, obstetrician advice said the condition could develop rapidly and be very difficult to diagnose. Tai had a raised temperature, heightened heart rate, low blood pressure and abdominal pain. These could have suggested a developing infection, the coroner's finding said, but could also have been something else. The HDC accepted in its own investigation that there were no "immediate red flags" from the readings. On her son, the same forensic pathologist found signs of sepsis infection and acute pneumonia in one of his lungs. They noted swabs taken from Tai and her baby grew the same type of bacteria, but they advised the infection was not likely to have spread from the placenta or in blood. Methamphetamine was found in baby Tanatui's liver - but not found in his mother's blood taken after she died. The findings released on Wednesday said this could be explained by the newborn being exposed to P in his home. The pathologist was not able to reach any conclusion about whether methamphetamine played any part in Tanatui's death, the coroner said. He was found sleeping on the couch with his mother in a prone position - an unsafe way to sleep and a risk factor in infant deaths. The way he was found also indicated he was partly underneath his mother which could have caused him to suffocate. The coroner ruled baby Tanatui died from either sepsis, or asphyxia from unsafe sleeping, or both. Coroner Woolley said the pair were co-sleeping and that there were loose blankets and pillows around him which increased the risk of accidental smothering. Tai first went to a community midwife clinic when she was 19 weeks pregnant but it was so busy she could only be seen as a quick review. She never went to any other appointments over the next four months. At the same time, a registered midwife tried to make contact with her but was not able to find or get hold of her. The next time Tai got antenatal care was when she was 37 weeks pregnant, with her blood tests showing she was anaemic. She was advised to change her address after the birth of her baby. The coroner's ruling said Health New Zealand told the HDC several changes to practices and policies were made after the deaths. These included training staff and updating guidelines for identifying maternal sepsis, and making a resource for patients. Guidelines were also made around minimum assessments for patients who did not have a lead maternity carer or who had used minimal antenatal care. There were also changes to the hospital discharge process and handover to community midwives. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
3 days ago
- RNZ News
Seaview Hospital fire: Building's long history in Hokitika
Hokitika's abandoned Seaview Hospital burned on Sunday Morning. Photo: Google Maps It has been a prison, a home for the mentally unwell and a spooky backpackers - and now it is the scene of a suspicious fire. Seven fire crews raced to Hokitika's abandoned Seaview Hospital on Sunday morning, perched on the hill just north of the town, to find the Kotuku building well alight in a spectacular blaze. It was out by evening, but the cause of the fire is now under investigation . Inside the Seaview Hospital. Photo: Supplied / Jane Comeau Historian Jane Comaeu wrote her masters thesis on the hospital - formerly known as Seaview Asylum - and its role in Hokitika's history. She said it began as a wing of the jail, housing people who were considered a threat to themselves or others, in 1871. Old baths remain in some rooms of the hospital. Photo: Supplied / Jane Comeau Public outcry over the treatment of mental patients saw it separated from the main jail building soon afterwards, and given its own superintendent. Psychiatric hospitals often had pretty negative connotations, Comeau said, and often for good reason. "They're spooky, they have ghosts, there's all this trauma - but I think there's this overlooked element of asylums* where they were a respite for people who didn't have a lot else for them in their life." Many who had been housed there suffered from illnesses they were never going to recover from, like dementia or "tertiary syphilis", Comeau said - people who "just needed a place to decline". But they were not as excluded from society as they would have been in other hospitals around the country. It was only a 15-minute walk from the Hokitika township, and the doctor would cycle up there every day. The inhabitants would be taken into town for excursions, and people from the town would come up for dances and parties. Many were cured, and some, when given the chance to leave, chose not to. "The West Coast was full of itinerant miners, people with nowhere to go, people with few social connections, and sometimes it was a choice between the asylum and nothing at all," Comeau said. Paul Breeze, who worked as a nurse at the hospital in the 1990s, said the hospital was a huge employer for Hokitika before dairy took over. "There was a time when there was hardly a household that didn't have a member of the family working there," he said. The patients who ended up there had often landed in the too-hard basket, he said - but they were treated well. It became a self-sufficient little community. By the late 1990s it was beginning to grow its own food, and even had its own fire brigade. Breeze likened it to the iconic British wartime sitcom Dad's Army - nobody was appropriately trained, but staff from various wards pitched in, driving about in a 1932 Ford V8. The brigade stayed active until the hospital's closure in the early 2000s, with only a handful of patients left to transfer elsewhere. The Kotuku building part of Seaview Hospital which burned down on Sunday. Photo: Google Maps Comeau visited the place herself in 2020. "You go through the door and there's a room full of metal bedframes all packed together, and then you walk down a hallway where the ceiling's partially collapsed, and you go into another room and there's a couple of old baths with metal railing where the curtains would have gone," she said. "And then you would have gone into an old games room, or living room, where there's a bunch of old chairs and graffiti all over the walls." Part of the precinct was used as a backpackers and campsite, called Seaview Lodge and Backpackers, for a number of years. The earliest review on Tripadvisor was left in December 2013, and according to later reviews, it remained open until February, with one guest calling it "an amazing place", and "a real curiosity to look around and find ward beds set up". The final review, in July, noted: "The place has once again been abandoned and a member of the cleaning staff advised that it's all closed again, including the hostel." "The graveyard is still eerie," it said. RNZ understands the building which caught on fire was not one used as part of the backpackers. *The word asylum is considered outmoded and often offensive, but Jane Comeau uses it here in order to reflect the attitudes towards mental health at the time. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
3 days ago
- RNZ News
Three fires across country over weekend
Fire investigators will return to the scene of a blaze in the former Seaview Psychiatric Hospital in Hokitika, which is being treated as suspicious. Photo: RNZ / Richard Tindiller Two house fires kept fire fighters in Auckland and the Manawatū District busy overnight while - further south - investigators will return to the scene of a suspicious fire in the former Seaview Psychiatric Hospital in Hokitika. Fire crews worked to extinguish a house fire in a single story home in Feilding which began shortly before 2am. A FENZ spokesperson said six fire trucks - from Feilding, Bunnythorpe, Milson, Palmerston North - fought the blaze. One person was treated for possible smoke inhalation by ambulance staff at the scene. The spokesperson said the blaze was suppressed by 3.40am but, as of 6am, five crews remained at the scene dampening down hotspots and monitoring for flare ups. The fire is not being treated as suspicious at this stage. Fire crews in Auckland were called to a home in Bombay at 7.17pm on Sunday. The single story residence was well alight by the time crews arrived and, at it's peak, six fire appliances supported by two water tankers fought the blaze. There were no reports of occupants in the building and no injuries were reported. Fire investigators will return to the scene on Monday morning to determine the cause of the fire. Meanwhile, on the West Coast of the South Island, fire investigators will return to the scene of a blaze in the former Seaview Psychiatric Hospital in Hokitika. The fire - which was well involved by the time fire crews arrived shortly after 7.11am on Sunday - is being treated as suspicious . The building had been abandoned after being used as a backpackers and campsite for several years following the closure of the hospital. There were no reports of injuries in the fire. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
