The government and owners knew well of the fire safety issues at New Lucky House years before yesterday’s fire cost five lives

Hours after a deadly inferno swept through a Nathan Road building killing five and injuring 35, the government revealed it had slapped fire safety orders on the owners multiple times since 2008 with no significant action taken and no enforcement follow-ups.

Buildings Department (BD) says it issued a Fire Safety Direction to the New Lucky House Owners Committee (OC) in 2008, “requiring the upgrading of certain fire safety provisions of the building to a level in line with the current fire safety standards, including the replacement of fire doors, provision of fire resisting enclosures to non-emergency services and provision of fixed lights meeting the required fire resistance and the like.”

The OC appointed a consultant to follow-up the Fire Safety Direction seven years later, in 2015 and then replaced the consultant in 2020, with the work still not even started.

BD then says it “followed up [] and issued an advisory letter urging for compliance but the Direction [was] still not complied with.”

BD says it also raised many other dangers regarding the building in 2018, including more problems with fire doors, provision of protected lobbies for escape staircases and other improvements required under the Fire Safety (Buildings) Ordinance.

The OC hired another consultant for this issue in 2019 and then in April 2023 informed BD it had, again, appointed another consultant. In May 2023, the OC said its new consultant had made “real progress” and, in its last communication with BD last year said its consultant was “preparing tender documents for the repair works and will discuss with the OC on the tendering for the contractor”.

BD says it will “continue to follow up with the OC and urge their commencement fo repair works as soon as possible.” BD said it will also “consider taking enforcement action if necessary”.

In addition, according to records, there have been seven complaints of unauthorised building works at New Lucky House – two of which BD now says were “actionable” and involved the lack of fire resistant doors and a missing fire compartment wall. BD issued removal orders to those relevant owners just three weeks ago, on 19 March 2024, yet no action had yet been taken. Again, BD says it is “considering initiating prosecution against the owners concerned”.

New Lucky House was one of 1,800 buildings targeted for urgent safety improvements after decades of inaction by owners committees on basic structural and fire safety. The government had excused errant building owners during the “concrete rain” season last year, claiming the pandemic had halted inspection work. But an investigation by Transit Jam revealed that around 4,000 potentially dangerous buildings had illegally ignored mandatory inspection notices for up to 10 years, with the majority of those safety notices issued well before the pandemic.

The fire broke out at around 8am yesterday morning with around 300 people in the building at the time. Residents escaping reported chaos in the hallways, with no exit signs visible and no fire alarms ringing. One of the five dead was thought to have fallen trying to escape from a higher floor, while others were found either in the corridor on the second floor or the staircase between the seventh and eight floors, according to FSD.

Chief Executive John Lee says the Security Bureau has taken over investigation from the Fire Services Department.