The death toll from a fire at a Hong Kong apartment complex rose to 146 on Sunday after investigators discovered more bodies in the charred buildings, the AP reported.
Meanwhile, mourners continued to lay flowers at the rapidly expanding makeshift memorial at the site
“The Hong Kong Police Disaster Identification Unit carefully went through the buildings and found bodies both in the apartment units and on the roofs,” said officer-in-charge Cheng Ka-chun.
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The buildings remain structurally sound, but the search has been slow, he told reporters, still wearing a white jumpsuit with a helmet and breathing mask on the side. “It’s so dark inside and the low lighting makes it very difficult to do this work, especially in places far from windows.”
The team has so far explored four of the seven blocks, Cheng said.
Another 100 people are missing and 79 have been injured, said Tsang Shuk-yin, head of Hong Kong’s police accident unit, AP reported.
At the crime scene, well-wishers bowed and said short prayers or left handwritten notes among the flowers.
An Indonesian woman prepares flowers to pray for the victims of the deadly November 26 fire at Tai Po in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park on November 30, 2025. Hong Kong was overwhelmed by an outpouring of grief on November 29 as thousands of people paid their respects and laid flowers for the 128 people killed in one of the city’s deadliest fires, marking the official start of three days of mourning. (Photo by Philip FONG/AFP)(AFP)
“This really serves as a wake-up call for everyone, especially with these super tall buildings,” said Lian Shuzheng, who waited in a line of hundreds of people to add their flowers to the growing cluster.
People also donated supplies to those who lost everything in the fire, which started on Wednesday and took until Friday to be fully extinguished.
Other constructions by the same builder are stopped
All eight buildings of the Wang Fuk Court complex in the suburb of Tai Po were clad in bamboo scaffolding covered with nylon netting for renovation, with windows covered with polystyrene panels. Authorities were investigating whether fire regulations had been violated.
Hong Kong officials announced late Saturday that they had ordered the immediate suspension of work on 28 construction projects carried out by the same contractor, Prestige Construction & Engineering Company, for safety audits.
“The five-alarm fire at Wang Fuk Court, Tai Po, exposed serious deficiencies in PC&E’s safety management at the site, including the extensive use of foam board to block windows during repairs to the building,” the government said in a statement.
The company did not respond to calls for comment on Sunday.
Three men – the directors and an engineering consultant of the construction company – were arrested a day after the fire on suspicion of manslaughter, and police said company executives were suspected of gross negligence. Police did not identify the business by name.
The three were released on bail but were then detained by Hong Kong’s anti-corruption authorities and eight other suspects, including scaffolding subcontractors, directors of an engineering consultancy and renovation project managers.
Defective fire alarms and foam panels are being investigated
The apartment complex of eight 31-storey buildings in Tai Po, a suburb near Hong Kong’s border with mainland China, was built in the 1980s. It had almost 2,000 apartments and more than 4,600 inhabitants.
Many are now housed in short-term emergency shelters or city hotels, and authorities are working on longer-term solutions.
“It’s heartbreaking,” said Jeffery Chan, a civil servant who came to pay his respects Sunday.
“Like Hong Kong, when people in the place where we live lose their families, lose everything in one night – if you put yourself in their shoes, it’s unbearable. They need encouragement, support and help from the people of Hong Kong,” he said.
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According to Chris Tang, Hong Kong’s security secretary, preliminary investigations showed the fire started on Wednesday afternoon on the lower level of scaffolding in one of the buildings and then quickly spread inwards as foam panels caught fire and blew out windows. The wind helped the flames jump from building to building and soon seven of the eight were engulfed.
According to Andy Yeung, director of the Hong Kong Fire Service, first responders discovered that some fire alarms in the complex, where many elderly people lived, did not sound when tested.
Among the victims were seven Indonesian migrant workers, with several dozen others still missing, according to the Indonesian Foreign Ministry. The Philippine Consulate General in Hong Kong reported that one Filipino domestic worker had died, while 12 others were still unaccounted for.
On Sunday afternoon, hundreds of Filipinos gathered in a pedestrian zone in central Hong Kong to say prayers and sing hymns in memory of those who died in the fire.
Read also | Hong Kong’s deadliest fire in years – 128 hits and counting
Meanwhile, in Beijing, China’s Ministry of Emergency Management announced it would conduct a nationwide inspection of high-rise buildings to detect and eliminate potential fire hazards.
“Bamboo scaffolding, fireproof safety nets… and fire fighting equipment and equipment such as fire hydrant systems, automatic sprinkler systems and automatic fire alarm systems will be among the main items to be inspected,” the ministry said.
