Fire in built environment

More than 900 households affected by the deadly fire in Tai Po have received HK$10,000 in emergency cash relief, the Hong Kong government has said.
Authorities registered over 1,800 households for the subsidy and handed out funds to 929 households as of Saturday afternoon, the government said in a statement in the early hours of Sunday.
The government will provide HK$200,000 as a “token of solidarity” to family members of every deceased victim, and a living allowance of HK$50,000 for each of the affected households in the coming week, it said.
Around 517 affected residents were seeking refuge in emergency government accommodation support as of Saturday afternoon, while 1,038 people had moved into transitional housing units. Two temporary shelters remain open for residents in need.
The death toll from the fatal blaze that broke out on Wednesday remains at 128 as of 3 pm on Saturday, after the Police Disaster Victims Identification Unit swept Wang Tao House and Wang Yan House. Both are considered less severely affected by the fire, though the unit found no bodies.
Around 150 residents remain unaccounted for. Police said on Saturday that there was limited or incomplete information concerning around 100 of them, which made search work challenging.

HK$1.1 billion relief fund
A support fund established by the government has raised around HK$800 million, the authorities said on Sunday. Together with the HK$300 million the government injected earlier, the fund now totals around HK$1.1 billion.
The government said the Social Welfare Department had been in touch with around 1,300 affected households and registered 3,200 residents for support services. These households will be assigned a social worker and two to three civil servants to provide support, including running errands and collecting supplies, it said.

Deadliest fire in decades
The blaze at Wang Fuk Court was Hong Kong’s deadliest fire since 1948, when an explosion followed by a fire killed at least 135 people. While the authorities have yet to confirm the cause of the tragedy, police said firefighters suspected that Styrofoam installed on windows for a large-scale renovation project did not meet fire safety requirements.
The Fire Services Department also tested the fire alarm systems in all eight blocks at the residential estate and found that the systems were “not in effective working order.”
Three men from a construction firm have been arrested by the police earlier for alleged manslaughter in connection with the deadly fire. They were released on police bail pending investigation but were apprehended again by the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) in relation to a corruption probe into the deadly incident.
The anti-graft agency also arrested eight others, including two directors at a construction consulting firm and three bamboo scaffolding subcontractors, in the same investigation.
Meanwhile, a man was arrested for alleged sedition on Saturday in relation to the blaze.