A small fire in a hotel in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, on Monday marked the third such fire in less than a week — and raises questions about building materials used in the city’s many high-rises, as Reuters reported on Monday.
Monday’s blaze at the Movenpick hotel in Dubai’s marina district was quickly extinguished, and no one was injured, according to Reuters. However just one day earlier there was another small fire at a nearby building — again, no injuries were reported — and on Friday, a fire broke out in Dubai’s 84-story Torch Tower, sending “flaming debris” falling to the ground below, CNN reported at the time.
The fire at Torch Tower, which was the tallest residential tower on the planet when it was completed in 2011, was the building’s second fire.
Just months after a deadly fire at London’s Grenfell Tower claimed at least 80 lives in June, the rash of recent fires in Dubai has ignited concerns about the heightened fire risks of high-rises.
The Grenfell Fire was widely believed to have spread quickly because of the materials used in the cladding on its exterior, which had been chosen as a cost-cutting measure during the tower’s refurbishment, the BBC reported in July.
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