It cost the National Fire Authority (NFA) $8,277,021 to attend to fire incidents for the Year 2020-2021.
This, according to NFA chief executive officer Puamau Sowane, who added that the amount had doubled. Mr Sowane said electrical appliances, arson and unattended cooking were the main causes of fire in the country.
“The rest are made up of matches, uncontrolled burning, prayer diya, kerosene/benzene, lantern/stove, mosquito coils, lit candles, overheated solar panels, fire crackers, gas leaks, welding sparks, fire places, flammable liquids and others,” he said.
“Having seen the causes of fires above it should give the public where our concern is.
“Now, if we look at our fire stats generally, 90 to 95 per cent of the structural fires are mainly from residential properties and only 5 to 10 per cent are from commercial fires.”
He said for most people fire safety was the least in their list of priorities.
“When you leave your house please report it to your neighbours to keep a watch on your homes because one thing that we identified was the continued burning of vacant homes as indicated in the stats that the second top causes of fires are arson.
“When you had a heavy outing the night before please don’t try to cook because in the middle of your cooking you will try to grab a quick nap and that is when fatal accidents do happen.
Mr Puamau said there had been a total of 77 fires recorded from January to July this year compared with 132 fires recorded for the 12 months period last year.
