Pavilion Apartment Resident Claims Power Outage Occurred Before Smoke Appeared

Jakarta (ANTARA) - A resident of the Pavilion Apartment in Tanah Abang, Central Jakarta, revealed that the electricity in the building went out twice before the smell of burning, flames, and thick smoke appeared on Friday afternoon.

“This morning around 09:30 WIB, the power went out twice; it would turn on and then go out again. I do not know if that was related or not, but there were power outages that morning,” said Ria, a resident of Tower 3, to reporters in Jakarta on Friday.

Ria stated that the electricity failed twice at approximately 09:30 WIB. However, she admitted she was not yet certain if these electrical disturbances were linked to the fire that broke out several hours later.

Ria began to smell something burning around 11:00 WIB.

At that time, she said, screams could be heard from around the building, although she did not see any flames inside her unit on the 8th floor.

“Then I smelled the burning smell around 11:00 WIB. That was when the burning smell started and people began screaming; it could be heard all the way to my unit,” she said.

Ria then checked the conditions outside through her window and saw thick black smoke billowing from units on the lower floors, suspected to have originated around the 5th or 6th floor.

“I looked from the window, and the smoke was coming from below, from the lower windows. It was perhaps about two or three floors below me. That is why I suspect it was from the 6th or 5th floor,” she said.

Seeing the situation, Ria and her husband immediately evacuated the unit, bringing their pet cat with them.

At the time, the lifts were unusable, so they chose to use the emergency stairs.

According to Ria, the emergency staircase used for the evacuation was already filled with smoke, forcing residents to hold their breath while descending.

“I went down immediately with my husband and my cat via the emergency stairs. Fortunately, we could still make it, but it was full of smoke, to the point where we had to hold our breath,” she said.

Ria also claimed that she did not see any water sprinklers activating during the evacuation process.

Meanwhile, several other residents were reported to still be inside their units, including some who were concerned about their pets left behind.

“As of now, some of my friends whose cats and dogs are still inside are still in the building,” Ria said.

It is known that officers are still evacuating residents from the upper floors using Bronto Skylift units.

A total of 23 fire engines and 115 personnel were deployed to handle the fire.