Heroism and grief: 6 residents’ stories from Wang Fuk Court fire hearings

Stories filled with tragic bravery, outrage at heedless officials and horror as loved ones perished were among those shared by 24 residents of the fire-ravaged Wang Fuk Court estate, as they testified at a public hearing investigating Hong Kong’s deadliest blaze in decades.Over multiple sessions that began on March 19, some told the presiding committee how their repeated efforts to raise bid-rigging and safety concerns about the estate’s exterior renovation fell on deaf ears, well before the 43-hour inferno destroyed seven of its eight buildings on November 26 last year.The conflagration killed 168 – including a firefighter – and displaced nearly 5,000 people. Polyfoam boards and substandard scaffold netting that turned the estate’s towers into tinderboxes were among the causes that added outrage to the community’s grief, as growing evidence painted the portrait of a wholly preventable disaster.