Thai fire exposes safety loopholes

Thai fire exposes safety loopholes

BANGKOK (Reuter): Thailand's worst hotel fire, which has
already claimed at least 90 lives, has triggered a public outcry
over a lack of enforcement of safety measures for high-rise and
public buildings.

Irate Thais voiced their anger on phone-in radio shows amid
reports that locked fire exits at the 400-room Royal Jomtien
Resort Hotel contributed to the high death toll.

The fire Friday at the beach resort of Pattaya, about 200 km
southeast of Bangkok, is the second major disaster in recent
years where blocked emergency exits appear to have trapped dozens
of hapless victims.

About 200 teenage workers died in May 1993 after fire broke
out inside a locked warehouse at the Kader Industrial toy factory
at Nakhon Pathom just north of Bangkok.

In both incidents, the hotel and factory owners ignored safety
standards and blocked emergency exits to protect their property
from theft.

"Whatever excuses were given by the hotel management (for
locking the exits) were unacceptable," a member of the National
Safety Committee said yesterday, adding that the Royal Jomtien
Resort hotel should also not have been allowed to have indoor
fire exits on upper floors located in the middle of the 16-story
building.

Some 136 tourists and hotel guests died in northeast Korat
province in August 1993 after the Royal Plaza Hotel collapsed
like a pack of cards. Officials blamed the collapse on earlier
unlicensed modification of the building.

A director of the Royal Jomtien Resort hotel conceded
yesterday that the ill-fated building, built in the late 1980s,
was not equipped with sprinkler and smoke detecting systems. He
said the hotel's fire alarms also failed to go off Friday.

Interior Minister Snoh Thienthong on Saturday blamed the hotel
management for storing cooking gas tanks in indoor kitchens.

Police said a gas explosion near the hotel's ground floor
cafeteria triggered the fire.