Senior fire safety staff putting together findings on Parliament fire - City of Cape Town

3rd January 2022

By: News24Wire

  

Font size: - +

Senior fire safety staff are putting together their findings after they looked into the cause of the fire that broke out at Parliament in Cape Town on Sunday.

Their findings will be handed over to the police, mayco member for safety and security JP Smith said.

The fire gutted the third floor of the Old Assembly building, including office space and the gymnasium. The roof of the Old Assembly building collapsed.

Parts of the ceiling at the New Assembly building, to which the fire spread, also collapsed. Extensive damage was caused to the National Assembly.

One of the aspects the fire safety officials will look into is how the fire spread from the Old Assembly to the New Assembly.

Smith says there could have been a second point of origin or the fire could have spread through the air-conditioning system.

"The aircon didn't switch off immediately because the electricity didn't switch off automatically. We had to manually switch off power to the precinct," Smith said. 

Initial findings pointed to potential maintenance issues in the building because some of the sprinklers were due for a maintenance service in 2020 and investigators were unable to find records confirming that the service was carried out, Smith said.

A 49-year-old man has been arrested in connection with the fire.

He is expected to appear in the Cape Town Magistrate's Court on Tuesday and faces charges under the National Key Point Act as well as counts of housebreaking, theft and arson. 

According to Hawks spokesperson Brigadier Nomthandazo Mbambo, the man was allegedly caught in possession of suspected stolen property by members of the Protection and Security Services after he gained unauthorised entry to the parliamentary precinct.

The findings will be key in efforts to establish whether he had any involvement in the fire, or if the fire was caused by an electrical fault.

Smith added that a fire at Parliament 10 months ago was due to an electrical fault.

Edited by News24Wire

Comments

The content you are trying to access is only available to subscribers.

If you are already a subscriber, you can Login Here.

If you are not a subscriber, you can subscribe now, by selecting one of the below options.

For more information or assistance, please contact us at subscriptions@creamermedia.co.za.

Option 1 (equivalent of R125 a month):

Receive a weekly copy of Creamer Media's Engineering News & Mining Weekly magazine
(print copy for those in South Africa and e-magazine for those outside of South Africa)
Receive daily email newsletters
Access to full search results
Access archive of magazine back copies
Access to Projects in Progress
Access to ONE Research Report of your choice in PDF format

Option 2 (equivalent of R375 a month):

All benefits from Option 1
PLUS
Access to Creamer Media's Research Channel Africa for ALL Research Reports, in PDF format, on various industrial and mining sectors including Electricity; Water; Energy Transition; Hydrogen; Roads, Rail and Ports; Coal; Gold; Platinum; Battery Metals; etc.

Already a subscriber?

Forgotten your password?

MAGAZINE & ONLINE

SUBSCRIBE

RESEARCH CHANNEL AFRICA

SUBSCRIBE

CORPORATE PACKAGES

CLICK FOR A QUOTATION