Electrical fault thought to be the cause of five-hour blaze on the 15th anniversary of Nairobi US embassy terrorist attack
An inferno ripped through Kenya’s main airport, the busiest in east Africa, on Wednesday, forcing it to shut down temporarily and causing disruption to thousands of passengers.
The five-hour blaze engulfed the arrival hall and lit up the early morning sky in the capital, Nairobi, sending billowing clouds of black smoke up in a plume visible miles away.
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The fire coincided with the 15th anniversary of a twin attack by Islamist militants on the American embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in neighbouring Tanzania but there was no immediate evidence that the attack was linked to terrorism. An electrical fault was thought more likely.
Uhuru Kenyatta, the Kenyan president, visited the scene and expressed concern over disrupted travel. A presidential statement said the cause of the fire is being investigated and that “there is no reason to speculate at this point.”
Business travellers and tourists were diverted to other airports. Two people were treated for smoke inhalation from the fire but there were no reports of fatalities.
Questions have been raised over the speed and quality of the emergency services response to the blaze, which started just before 5am and spread unchecked to become the worst on record at Jomo Kenyatta international airport, a hub used for connections all over Africa.
The fire gutted the arrival hall, where passengers pass through immigration and retrieve their luggage. On Wednesday, neat lines of metal trolleys with melted plastic handles were the only clear reminder it was once an airport terminal. The flames did not reach the domestic or departure terminals, separated from the arrivals hall by a road.
The Associated Press (AP) reported that its journalist on the scene saw uniformed officers line up with buckets in hand, apparently to battle the blaze. “I would have expected more fire engines to respond faster,” a British passenger, Martyn Collbeck, who had been scheduled to fly to London on an early morning KLM flight, told AP.
Kenya’s Daily Nation newspaper reported last month that Nairobi county does not have a single working fire engine. One engine, the paper said, was auctioned off in 2009 because the county had failed to pay a $100 repair bill. Many of the responding units to Wednesday’s fire were from private security firms and struggled through heavy traffic to reach the airport.
An unnamed government official at the site said an initial assessment showed that a complacent response helped a small fire grow into an uncontrollable inferno..
On Wednesday, travellers searched for their luggage amid the charred ruins while staff from western embassies waved their national flags to attract passengers looking for a place to stay. “We are now here illegally since we don’t have a visa and therefore can’t leave the airport,” Juan Cabrera, a French UN worker travelling to Zanzibar from Burundi with his wife and baby, told Reuters. “I’m just wondering how I get back home or continue our trip. No one seems to know.”
