At least 27 people were killed in a fire at a Japanese clinic

Author: Kiyoshi Takenaka

TOKYO (Reuters) – At least 27 people are believed to have been killed in a fire at a psychiatric clinic in Osaka, Japan, on Friday, and media reported that police were investigating the alleged fire.

About 27 people were at a cardiopulmonary arrest, an official from the Osaka City Fire Department told Reuters that the term was used in Japan before a death was officially confirmed. Authorities said another person was injured.

Nine people have been confirmed dead at the hospital, Asahi TV said.

Police were investigating the alleged fire when a man set fire to the building, Kyodo News reported, citing people involved in the investigation.

An elderly man spilled flammable liquid and put an ignited bag into the building, Yomiuri newspaper reported. The man was believed to be a patient at the clinic, the Mainichi newspaper reported.

The fire broke out shortly after the clinic, on the fourth floor of a multi-storey office building, opened at 10am (0100 GMT) and was extinguished within 30 minutes, the NHK public channel reported.

The NHK video showed smoke coming out of the fourth-floor windows and on the roof. Later, the windows were on fire, blackened and burnt.

“When I looked outside I saw orange flames on the window on the fourth floor of the building. A woman was shaking her hands from the window on the sixth floor to ask for help,” a 36-year-old woman working for a company near Kyodo told.

Located in a shopping and entertainment district not far from Osaka’s main train station, the building also has a beauty salon, a clothing store and an English school, NHK said.

Another woman said she saw smoke coming out of the window and told Kyodo that the power had been briefly turned off in the area.

In 2019, a fire at an animation studio in Kyoto killed more than 30 people and injured dozens.