Probe continues to search out out the reason for the fireplace, however the vitality firm says a pipe leak was detected earlier than the fireplace.
Residents have searched by means of the stays of their charred houses after a gas storage depot fireplace in Jakarta killed not less than 17 folks, together with two youngsters.
The hearth, which began at roughly 8pm (01:00 GMT) on Friday from a gas pipe at Pertamina’s Plumpang gas storage depot in capital Jakarta, shortly unfold to close by homes and despatched residents within the densely populated space right into a panic.
Sixty folks have been injured, with many severely burned, whereas a whole lot extra residing in residential areas close to the depot needed to be evacuated.
The North Jakarta Purple Cross stated 342 folks had been evacuated and that 4 tents have been arrange for the displaced.
Three folks have been nonetheless lacking after the blaze, with Indonesian officers the subsequent day calling for an audit of “all gas services and infrastructures” within the nation.
Vice President Ma’ruf Amin visited the scene on Saturday and confirmed 17 folks have been killed and 60 extra injured.
He urged the depot needs to be moved away from residential neighbourhoods.
“I hope this depot could be relocated … so will probably be safer and this space will likely be rearranged so it meets the necessities of a correct neighbourhood within the capital,” he advised reporters.
Footage broadcast on Friday night time confirmed folks screaming and fleeing by means of slim roads with an inferno lighting up the sky behind them.
A fireball might be seen throughout the skyline of north Jakarta with sirens wailing within the background.
Abdul Syukur, who additionally lives close by, advised Kompas TV that residents stated they may odor the gas about half-hour earlier than the fireplace.
“The odor was so robust there have been folks throwing up and a few practically fainted,” he stated.
One other witness, Swastono Aji, advised AFP information company that the odor “was so robust that we might hardly breathe”.
“We have been leaving this space once we immediately heard a really loud explosion.”
‘Mini apocalypse’
“It was like a bomb, like a mini apocalypse. It was unimaginable,” witness Jamilul Asror, 45, advised AFP, calling on authorities to relocate residents farther away.
Nationwide Police chief Listyo Sigit, talking on the website, stated not less than three folks have been nonetheless lacking.
Prime officers have known as for a probe into the fireplace’s trigger and an audit of the nation’s vitality services after a number of latest blazes.
“After we had a number of fires … it’s clear that we should audit all gas services and infrastructures, particularly tanks and refineries,” Sugeng Suparwoto, head of the parliament’s vitality fee, advised native broadcaster Metro TV on Saturday.
In 2021, a large blaze broke out on the Balongan refinery in West Java, additionally owned by Pertamina.
That very same depot noticed fires in 2009 and once more in 2014 – when the flames unfold to 40 homes close by. No casualties have been reported in both of these instances.
The morning after the blaze, houses stacked up in opposition to the barbed-wire fences of the Pertamina facility have been gutted and blackened, with rows of automobiles burned out.
