Nine killed, 16 hurt in fire at hospice in Taiwan’s New Taipei City

Nine people were killed and 16 injured in a blaze that broke out early Monday morning at a hospice in Taiwan, fire officials said.

All of the 36 people inside, including three staff, were evacuated after the fire started in the palliative care facility on the seventh floor of the nine-storey Ministry of Health and Welfare Taipei Hospital in New Taipei City.

Sixteen had cardiac arrests and seven were revived. Smoke inhalation was given as the cause of death for the nine people who died, according to the local fire service.

The city’s fire service chief Huang Te-ching said the cause of the fire was being investigated and denied reports that the sprinkler system had malfunctioned.

“The sprinkler device was on but there’s some distance between its location and where the fire started so the fire couldn’t be immediately put out,” he told reporters.

Central News Agency, said citing the fire service, that a foreign carer reported a spark on a bed in the hospice ward at 4:36am on Monday, but by the time emergency crews arrived, the fire had spread throughout the ward.