This is why we have regulations
A huge fire at a Bangladeshi factory whose workers were making clothes and fabrics for top Western labels has killed seven people in the latest disaster to blight the country’s garment industry.
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“Two bodies have been identified and handed over to their relatives. Five other bodies were charred beyond recognition,” local police chief Amir Hossain told AFP, revising down an earlier toll of nine.
Workers said the overnight blaze appeared to have been started by a malfunctioning knitting machine which had caught fire on previous occasions.
Bolding is mine.
We have all heard of the resistance to new regulations for workers in Bangladeshand other '3rd World' countries where people work for close to nothing (and whom were beaten and shot with rubber bullets by police recently during massive protests demanding a $100/month basic minimum wage).
Here we have basic luck preventing who-knows-how-many people from dying in an "intense fire' caused by a machine KNOWN to catch fire.
Safety standards at Bangladesh’s 4,500 garment factories, where workers toil for 10-12 hours a day for a monthly minimum wage of $38, are notoriously lax and fires are a common problem.
The article, from AFP - if that is an issue for the reader - cites a number of multinational clothing and material distributors (Gap, Next, H&M, Australian Target) engaging in hemming and hawing about who is responsible for what, distancing themselves from responsibility to supervise or "audit' working conditions.