Fire at School Dormitory in Kenya Kills at Least 17. President William Ruto called the news “devastating.” The police said the cause of the blaze was being investigated.
A fire in a school dormitory in Kenya killed 17 students and seriously burned 13 others, the police said on Friday, and there were fears that the death toll would rise.
The cause of the fire on Thursday night at Hillside Endarasha Primary in Nyeri County, north of Nairobi, was being investigated, said a police spokeswoman, Resila Onyango.
President William Ruto called the news “devastating” and said action would be taken against those responsible.
The blaze in Nyeri county’s Hillside Endarasha Academy broke out at around midnight, police said, engulfing a dormitory where the children were sleeping.
“There are 17 fatalities from this incident, and there are also others who were taken to the hospital with serious injuries,” said national police spokesperson Resila Onyango.
Police did not release the ages of the victims.
“The bodies recovered at the scene were burnt beyond recognition,” she said.
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Several others were injured, Onyango said, 16 of them seriously, and had been rushed to a nearby hospital.
“More bodies are likely to be recovered once (the) scene is fully processed,” she said.
The cause of the fire remains unknown, she said, but an investigation had been launched.
The school has been cordoned off, Kenya Red Cross said on X, adding it was providing “psychosocial support services” to those affected by “the tragic fire incident”.
The fire had burnt the students beyond recognition, Citizen Television said earlier.
School fires are common in Kenyan boarding schools, where many students stay because parents believe it gives them more time to study without long commutes.
Some fires have been started by students during protests over the workload or living conditions. In 2017, 10 high school students died in a school fire in the capital, Nairobi.
In 2001, 58 schoolboys were killed in a dormitory fire at Kyanguli Secondary School outside Nairobi.
In 2012, eight students were killed at a school in Homa Bay County in western Kenya.
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