Fire guts Kisubi High School dormitory

Jul 20, 2009

Fire on Sunday night gutted a dormitory complex for Senior Six students at Kisubi High School on Entebbe Road, reducing it to a shell.

By Gladys Kalibbala

Fire on Sunday night gutted a dormitory complex for Senior Six students at Kisubi High School on Entebbe Road, reducing it to a shell.

The fire, which the Police suspected to be an act of arson, started at about 7:00pm.

The Police said due to the intense heat fuelled by highly combustible material such as mattresses, the roof caved in, crashing the walls.

Fire fighters from the Civil Aviation Authority, Entebbe Police Station and the fire brigade headquarters in Kampala fought to contain the fire, but by the time they were done, neither the building nor the property had been saved.

No student, however, was injured.

The school authorities said the fire started when the students were attending night preps in the classrooms.

The Police said the fire was first noticed by two teachers who raised an alarm, prompting the authorities to notify the Police.

The watchmen narrated how they struggled to restrain the students from entering the dormitory to rescue their books.

An area resident said by the time most people noticed the fire, it had already become wild.

Addressing journalists at the school on Sunday, the Kampala Police chief, Andrew Sorowen, said though the cause of the fire had not been established, the Police suspected arson.

“All indications show that somebody deliberately caused this fire. We need co-operation from the staff, students and the community to identify the culprits,” Sorowen said.

Sunday’s incident broke a lull that the country has been experiencing since the spate of school fires that had gripped the country last year.

Meanwhile, Sorowen has criticised parents who turned up at the school during the incident, for insulting the fire fighters.

“As we were busy putting out the fire, they were hurling insults at us,” he complained.

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