Machakos, Kenya — A gasoline-fueled fire struck a dormitory crowded with sleeping schoolboys on Monday, killing 58 teen-agers. The building had only one unlocked door, and many boys died as they struggled to escape through the 10 barred windows.
Some boys were on fire when they ran from the dorm into the pouring rain, students said. Twenty-eight boys were injured, nine of them critically.
Police suspect arson in a fire that killed 58 boys and seriously injured another 28 in a boarding school dormitory fire in Machakos, Kenya. Attendants at the Kenyatta National Hospital unloaded a burn victim Monday in Nairobi, Kenya.
One teen-age survivor said school officials investigated a gasoline smell in the building over the weekend. Other boys said students were angry because authorities annulled the results of final exams and because the headmaster ordered students to pay all back fees.
Police said they strongly suspected arson at Kyanguli Secondary School in Machakos, a farming town 30 miles southeast of Kenya's capital, Nairobi.
Boys who escaped said they believe a disgruntled student doused the floor of the dormitory with gasoline and set it afire. Although the building was stone, its raw timber beams burned quickly and the corrugated steel roof collapsed within 20 minutes, police said.
Samuel Muthoka, 16, said he awoke to screams and found the dormitory one of three at the school filled with smoke and flames about 1:20 a.m. He escaped through the main door but said intense flames trapped many others.
Charred bodies blocked the walkway through the middle of the dormitory, which was lined with bunkbeds like a military barracks. The 130-by-50-foot building had a door at either end and barred windows. One door was padlocked from the outside.
Younger, smaller students said they wriggled out through a gap between the walls and roof. But bodies were piled by each barred window.
After the roof collapsed, the rain put out the fire, said Wellington Choka, the district police chief. He said he believed many boys were crushed trying to escape or died of smoke inhalation.
Choka said 58 bodies were found in the dormitory, but none had been identified. Thousands of people gathered at the school Monday, waiting for news.
Several students said the first sign of trouble came Friday when anonymous notes were posted in the school's toilets and the dining hall, calling on students to boycott classes and march to protest the annulment of exams and the order to pay school fees.
Muthoka said most students 600 were enrolled in all ignored the note. He said when he went into his dorm on Saturday night, he smelled gasoline, but no one knew why.
The next day, school officials investigated the smell, but no action was taken, students said. School officials refused to speak to journalists about the fire.
Michak Mutuku, 18, said he believes the author of the notes was angered when most students ignored the call for a protest. Mutuku, and other students, said they believe that is why the fire was set.
"I think it's because we went to classes," Mutuku, whose arm was severely burned, said from his hospital bed at Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi.
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