The impotence of the firefighting services in Kinshasa: an emergency to be underlined
The city of Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, has experienced a series of serious fires in recent years. Markets, public buildings and homes were reduced to ashes, highlighting the shortcomings and helplessness of the firefighting services.
It is alarming to note that Kinshasa’s fire services are ill-equipped and underfunded. Fire vehicles are rare and often in poor condition, protective suits and boots are lacking, and there is a dire lack of fire hydrants, metal ladders and ropes needed to carry out effective rescue operations. .
The Kinshasa fire brigade, which is supposed to intervene in the event of a disaster, is faced with many problems. She struggles to get to the scene of the fires quickly due to lack of mobility, and even when she gets there, she quickly runs out of water due to the low capacity of her tankers and the lack of fire hydrants in some areas of the city.
This worrying finding highlights the lack of an effective policy for preventing and fighting fires in Kinshasa. While the city was once well equipped and town planning standards required the presence of fire hydrants in each high-rise building, these security measures have been neglected over time.
The situation is particularly worrying in the urban markets of Kinshasa, which mainly operate in the streets. Wooden stalls and precarious shacks provide a breeding ground for fires, and there is currently no guarantee of safety for merchants and their goods.
It is urgent that the Kinshasa authorities take concrete measures to remedy this situation. It is imperative to provide the firefighting services with adequate means, to improve the firefighting infrastructure throughout the city and to put in place a more rigorous fire prevention policy.
It is also essential to inform and raise public awareness of the safety measures to be adopted in the event of a fire, in order to limit human and material losses.
Fire safety is a major issue for a city as dense and dynamic as Kinshasa