Attachments
Description of the Event
What happened, where and when?
In South Africa, unstructured fires are on the rise in the informal settlements especially in this winter season.
The fire that blazed one of the five-Storey dilapidated buildings in Johannesburg CBD earliest hours on the 31st of August 2023 left about 175 households which were hosting about 422 people immense plight to meet their basic needs. From BBC information, at least 76 fatalities have been recorded, search and rescue services still continue as some bodies are believed to be still trapped inside the building. The Johannesburg Metro indicated that the building was invaded as it was disregarded of not meeting the standards of safe shelter due to its dilapidated state.
This fire outbreak come after reported fires incidents also in Durben. Indeed, on 16th of July 2023, a fire incident was already reported in the KwaZulu Natal province, specifically on Kennedy Road informal settlement. This caused adverse impact leaving 2,357 people (647 children and 1710 adults) displaced with almost all their belongings swept away by the strong fire. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-66215286.
Following the report from Disaster Management Centre confirming the incident and rapid assessment conducted by the NS, SARCS has activated response team to assist with KwaZulu Natal province fire response. IFRC supported the scale-up of the SARCS initiated assistance through an allocation of CHF 214,419 allowing to extend their response capacity to the expressed needs in the different evacuation centers. The recent outbreak in Johannesburg require now to deploy same humanitarian services to the affected communities that are also leave without any substantial assistance week after the fire outbreak.
Scope and Scale
The two fire outbreaks were respectively reported in different context that influence the response approach and also play a key role on the scope and complexity of each situation. SARCS analysis based on rapid assessments, coordination and monitoring is taking into consideration each scope as follows:
A- First in Kennedy road - Kwazulu Natal in Durban (On the 16th of July 2023).
This was the worst fire incident in recent years in the area with about 2,357 people have been affected and displaced, being 647 children and 1,710 adults. This represents in 1,213 families. The devastating fire, which broke out on that day, resulted in complete destruction to more than 1,101 houses, leaving over a thousand people displaced, 02 fatalities and some reported injuries. SARCS KZN provincial response team rapid assessments of 17 July revealed also that: more than 1,101 households have seen their houses destroyed; 112 houses partially destroyed.
B- Second in Johannesburg city, rural area. 422 people were affected, representing 175 households now homeless. The assessments from both NS and from other sources have shown that 98% of the affected population are undocumented migrants and of these 72% are men. In most cases like these, these men are usually the breadwinners who are financially supporting their families back home and by virtue of them being undocumented it means they have no bank accounts which implies that they keep their money for remittances with them and any other things that they would have bought but due to the fires, they are left with absolutely nothing except the clothes they escaped the fire with.
The few women that are there are equally vulnerable because they would have lost everything as well in the fire and by virtue of them resorting to living in such a dilapidated building it shows that they have very low sources of income so this fire makes them even more vulnerable as they will not have anywhere to go at all after this and might have lost their jobs as well as they are trying to figure out tentative accommodation considering most undocumented migrants are not formally employed.
In both situation, people who were affected by the fire incident were evacuated to centers, commonly local community/public areas whilst waiting for assistance and support. A lot of women, unaccompanied children especially in Johannesburg were affected. This incident brings up the need for food and water immediate and in coming weeks, school uniforms water supply, hygiene packs, mental health support and other Essential household items (EHI) etc.