Expert blames spread of smoke as main cause of deaths in Wang Fuk Court blaze

This story has been made freely available as a public service to our readers. Please consider supporting SCMP’s journalism by subscribing.An independent committee will wrap up hearing testimony from experts on the factors behind Hong Kong’s deadliest fire in decades, with the legal representatives to make their closing remarks in mid-July.Polytechnic University professors Asif Usmani and Jiang Liming are scheduled to testify at the final session of a public evidential hearing on Thursday.Their testimonies will shed further light on the blaze that broke out at Wang Fuk Court on November 26 last year, while the estate was undergoing renovation.The fire lasted for about 43 hours and killed 168 people, making it the city’s deadliest fire since 1948.Yiu Men-yeung, assistant director for the Fire Services Department’s New Territories South section and the head of the government’s interdepartmental investigation task force, on Wednesday outlined five key factors behind the fire’s heavy death toll of the inferno.They included the quick spread of the flames and the replacement of fireproof windows at the staircases with moveable boards to allow workers’ easy access to the scaffolding, which allowed the fire and smoke to enter the stairways and compromised residents’ means of escape.Other factors identified by Yiu were exits being blocked by debris, a deactivated fire alarm system and obstructed windows reducing visibility.The committee also heard on Wednesday that the scaffolding mesh used at the renovation site was non-fire-retardant, which ignited other combustible materials and caused embers to spread to other blocks, leading to the “exponential” growth of fire.Professor Richard Yuen Kwok-kit, who was appointed as the task force’s fire engineering professional, said that the blaze might not have started if the fire-retardant scaffolding mesh had been used.Follow the South China Morning Post’s live coverage as more details unfold. coverage: