Fire destroys hundreds of shops in Senen
Fire destroys hundreds of shops in Senen
JAKARTA (JP): A fire that started on Thursday night and burned
for more than 15 hours has gutted hundreds of shops in the
basement of the three-story Senen shopping center in Central
Jakarta.
At 3 p.m. on Friday, fire fighters equipped with oxygen masks
were still struggling to find the source of the fire and
extinguish it in the hazy, dark basement.
Traders who own shops in the stories above the fire blighted
basement worked to rescue their stock until late yesterday
evening.
No fatalities were reported, but traders at the usually
crowded shopping center estimated damage running into billions of
rupiah had been caused.
Data from the city market firm PD Pasar Jaya, which runs the
shopping center, revealed the basement was home to at least 1,087
restaurants and shops offering good ranging from cloth, garments
and household goods to gas bottles.
Hundreds of tailors and shops selling electronic goods are
located on the second story and a similarly large number of
automobile spare part stores are on the third floor.
The top story is used as a car parking lot facility by the
management of the building, which lies adjacent to the Atrium
plaza.
The fire was first reported to Central Jakarta Fire Department
at 11:35 p.m. on Thursday. Seventeen fire engines and 150 fire
fighters were hastily dispatched to the scene.
The head of the fire department, Robert Kamasi, said locked
rolling doors and inflammable goods in the shops had hindered
efforts to bring the blaze under control.
"But Alhamdullilah (Thanks to God) we have taken out most of
the gas bottles and only three exploded inside (the center),"
Robert said.
In the evening, Robert said he feared that hot air from the
burning basement could ignite goods in shops on the upper
stories, where shop owners and their employees were still busy
evacuating their merchandises.
Nobody had obeyed his warning to stay off the upper floors of
the mall, despite the danger which it posed to their lives.
"The traders insisted that they had to save their goods or
else they would not be able to feed their children anymore," he
said.
The shopping center was gutted by major fires in 1974 and
1995.
Despite the two previous fires, the building's management had
still failed to equip the shopping center with adequate fire
safety equipment, Robert said.
"I could only find one broken hydrant in front of this
building," he said.
Robert also blamed PD Pasar Jaya for being careless enough to
allow people to sell gas bottles and cook in the basement of the
shopping center.
"The management should not allow any cooking activities or the
sale of gas in the basement," he said.
Gerda Rosalina, the head of the shopping center's management,
was not available for comment yesterday.
Even before the smoke had cleared, some enterprising traders
denied their day's business had set up stalls along nearby
streets with goods they had managed to salvage.
A tired looking Anton, 31, was trying to sell stained clothes
at the roadside.
"I have to try to sell everything that I managed to save. Who
knows, somebody might want to buy them and help me to earn a
living.
"It's better than standing around watching the fire fighters,"
he added.
Anton arrived at the burning site early on Friday morning
after being notified of the fire by his fellow traders.
With the help of fire fighters, he managed to save some of his
stock from the burning basement.
"I only managed to save eight bags of clothes, the other
twelve were gone," he recalled.
Police and military personnel set up a tight guard on all
access roads to the building in an attempt to avoid looting.
(emf)