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Four perish in two residential fires in Tokyo

9 Comments

Four people died in two fires that destroyed their residences in Tokyo overnight.

In Nerima Ward, a fire broke out in a three-story wooden house at around 7 a.m. Sunday, Sankei Shimbun reported. It took firefighters about three hours to extinguish the blaze.

Police said a family of four lived in the house. Two bodies were found — a woman in her 60s and her son who was in his 20s. The woman’s husband, in his 50s, and the couple’s daughter, in her 20s, managed to escape from the house and were not injured.

Police and firefighters are investigating how the blaze started.

In another fire, flames were seen coming from the first-floor apartment of a building in Suginami Ward at around 10 p.m. Saturday. Seventeen fire trucks were mobilized.

The fire was extinguished just after midnight. Inside the ruins were the bodies of a man and a woman, later identified as Akio Fujita, 46, and his wife Kazuko, 55.

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9 Comments
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Colder nights and more kerosene stove usage? Or not going outside to smoke because it is too cold out?

6 ( +6 / -0 )

Whatever it is......the fire codes over here are obsolete.....have you ever been to a Donki store?

It is mind-blowing!

Was in Yoyogi yesterday and there was a small kitchen fire and tons of fire engines and ambulances arrived......for basically nothing.Meanwhile,stores like the above mentioned don't adhere to any logical fire codes.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Meanwhile,stores like the above mentioned don't adhere to any logical fire codes.

I thought that after the fatal 2004 arson fire in Don Quijote they were forced to redesign their stores to meet code.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

The electrical code in Japan is so outdated that this is leading to more fires as well as damage during lightning storms. Surge damage is quite common but most people right it off to something being old and so they just go and buy a new one.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Colder nights and more kerosene stove usage?

Yes, NHK says using an alcohol hand sanitizer near a kerosene stove and such is very dangerous. Yes, there's a possibility of fire.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

We keep seeing these over and over again.

Where are the smoke alarms to alert the sleeping occupants?

By law they have been required in new builds in JP since 2006. Older buildings also require them by law, but as with many things in Japan, it all depends on which municipality they are in, and no one checks to see they are in place.

So many lives could have been saved if these simple devices were in widespread use?

https://www.n-bouka.or.jp/materials/pdf/02_pr_e_d.pdf

1 ( +1 / -0 )

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