Tai Po fire hearing: contractor admits negligence over problems with water tanks

This story has been made freely available as a public service to our readers. Please consider supporting SCMP’s journalism by subscribing.Public hearings by a judge-led independent committee investigating Hong Kong’s deadliest blaze in decades have entered their sixth day and will continue to focus on the deactivation of the fire alarm system and its impact on the ravaged Wang Fuk Court housing estate.Chung Kit-man, director and engineer of Victory Fire Engineering, the contractor responsible for the estate’s fire services equipment, continued his testimony on Tuesday morning.He was questioned by a committee lawyer on whether the cables for the fire alarm system met quality standards.Chung was also asked about the findings of an annual inspection flagging problems with the estate’s water tanks – problems he neglected to mention in a certificate filed with the Fire Services Department.The independent committee heard on Monday that the fire alarm and firefighting pump systems at the Tai Po estate were found to have been switched off a week before the tragedy that killed 168 people struck, with no action taken to reactivate them.An engineer and an electrical worker at Victory Fire Engineering, Wang Fuk Court’s fire services equipment contractor, are expected to testify on Tuesday, along with representatives from ISS EastPoint Properties, which oversaw the estate’s management.Follow our live updates on the sixth day of the hearing.Reporting by Leopold Chen, Matthew Cheng and Jeffie Lam. coverage: