HONG KONG
\nVictims of Hong Kong\u2019s deadliest fire in decades began government-supervised visits to their ravaged former homes on Monday for the first time since the November blaze, looking to retrieve personal items that might have survived.
\nThe flames that engulfed seven residential towers, each of 31 floors in the northern district of Tai Po, killing 168 people, took nearly two days to douse, and eclipsed London\u2019s Grenfell Tower inferno of 2017.
\n\u201cI have taken away most of the stuff I wanted, those items of value,\u201d said Steven Chung, 50, adding that he did not \u200cknow how to \u200cdescribe his emotions after sifting through his old apartment but now \u200cworries more about finding affordable housing.
\nChung was among around 270 former residents returning to the complex on Monday, many carrying objects such as paintings, computers, and bicycles as they left the government-subsidized housing. A former resident surnamed Leung said he was able to find his wedding ring easily as it glittered through the ashes of his room where he had kept it.
\n\u201cTrue gold fears no fire,\u201d he said. Photos of his scorched apartment he shared with Reuters showed charcoal-grey debris with only a few household objects including a plate intact. Walls and window grates were completely charred.
\nA 67-year-old \u200cwoman surnamed Tsang said she was happy she found \u200cher burnt jewelry box under her bed. \u201cI found the jewel box under the bed among the \u200cashes. That\u2019s the only thing I can retrieve,\u201d she said. Until May 4, former residents \u200cof the complex, Wang Fuk Court, can spend three hours in their flats on each visit, while wearing facemasks, helmets and gloves for protection.
\nFiremen are among the 1,000 staff tasked to assist the estimated total of 6,000 visitors, who will be escorted by officials to ensure items are kept safe. \u201cI hope \u200ceveryone will abide by the three-hour rule,\u201d Warner Cheuk, Hong Kong\u2019s deputy chief secretary, told reporters outside the complex, patrolled by officers and cordoned off with orange tape and crowd-control barriers.
\nUp to four people can register to enter each home, but for severely damaged flats the number is limited to one. Many affected residents are elderly, with more than a third older than 65, Midland Realty\u2019s analysis of government data showed. Months after the fire, people in the Asian financial hub are still grasping for answers to how it started and demanding accountability.
\nAn independent committee began hearings in March to decide the causes and the scale of bid-rigging by construction firms in building projects. The panel\u2019s lead lawyer blamed human factors for the failure of most of the fire safety systems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
HONG KONG Victims of Hong Kong\u2019s deadliest fire in decades began government-supervised visits to their ravaged former homes on Monday for the first time since the November blaze, looking to retrieve personal items that might have survived. The flames that engulfed seven residential towers, each of 31 floors in the northern district of Tai Po, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":542972,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-542961","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n