A fire burning at an orphanage in Algeria’s capital has killed at least 11 people including children, authorities said Thursday, amid a heatwave that has sparked hundreds of blazes in the country’s north.
Firefighters had been battling to extinguish the flames since before dawn in the Mohammadia suburb of Algiers.
“At around 3am, we heard the fire engines arriving and the children screaming,” said Abdessalam Merrah, 41, who lives nearby.
“We helped as much as we could, but unfortunately we were told that 11 people had already died.”
An AFP journalist saw black stains around the building’s windows on Thursday morning. A witness said firefighters had used a chainsaw to remove metal bars from a window.
The Algerian civil defense said the toll was provisional and added that another 19 people were injured in the fire, the cause of which is unknown.
Rachid Belhadj, head of the forensic medicine department at Mustapha Bacha Hospital, told local television that some of the bodies were completely burned and required DNA tests to be identified.
Algeria’s President Abdelmadjid Tebboune later said “several children” were among the dead.
National television showed Prime Minister Sifi Ghrieb visiting the wounded at two medical facilities in Algiers.
Algeria has been sweltering under a heatwave for several days, and nearly 1,000 fires have been recorded in the space of a week.
From July 8 to 15, the civil defense reported 932 fires, according to state media. Most had been extinguished but a small number were still burning.
One municipal worker died battling a blaze in the northern province of Setif, a local mayor said Wednesday.
The civil defense said it had mobilized more than 19,000 personnel and 700 trucks to battle forest fires, as well as six helicopters and 12 water-bombing aircraft.
It has also evacuated some residents in the provinces of Bejaia, Guelma, Bouira and Mila, according to the APS state news agency.
Every summer, northern Algeria is struck by forest fires, a phenomenon exacerbated by drought and climate change.
The fires have killed dozens of people in recent years and destroyed thousands of hectares of forest or farmland, along with numerous homes.
Authorities say they believe some fires were started deliberately, with several suspects arrested.