Qatar Mall Fire - 13 children, 4 teachers & 2 firefighters

[Mattt]

Absolutely shocking story today here in Doha, made worse by the almost denial of the incident by local media outlets.

http://dohanews.co/

The fire detection & sprinkler system was allegedly turned off, and the mall staff ran away rather than evacuate the children & other shoppers.

No Qataris died, only foreigners so I'm expecting no proper investigation.

[scenario8]

I just read a bit on the BBC webpages (which presumably were regurgitated from another source. Terribly sad losses.

Should I be surprised the shopping mall (that was built in 2006) didn't have operable sprinklers and witnesses claim the evacuation was, er, below western expectations? Is Qatar still a little sub-par when it comes to accountability/investigations/standards etc? (I honestly know so little of that part of the world).

[Mattt]

scenario8 said:

Is Qatar still a little sub-par when it comes to accountability/investigations/standards etc?

Very much so, despite what their glossy 'World Cup 2022' brochures would have you believe.

[scenario8]

Friends of ours lived in Dubai for five years and had children whilst living there. They live back in the UK now and say they'd never return. They had some stories to tell of open bribery, abuse of official powers etc. They say life wasn't exactly as free and transparent as you might imagine as a UK citizen - especially for the lower classes locals or shipped in manual workers.

Still, with incredibly low taxation, an alluring ex-pat scene and a business friendly environment (that I'm sure has downsides, too) I can understand why some would do it. Not for me.

[Mattt]

Oh for sure there are advantages to living in the Middle East, and the place often gets a bad wrap in the UK press.

Incidents like this remind you that behind the glitz and gold, there are still real problems here that are not being addressed.

[scenario8]

We've even got your weather over here now.

[Kermit power]

This is the sort of thing that people tend to conveniently forget when they're moaning about the nanny state in this country.

Keeping kids alive is worth a bit of extra hassle in my book.

[Puggit]

Nevermind about 2022, I'm sure Blatter and his cronies got what they wanted from Qatar

[croyde]

Awful news. I worked in Doha last year and I know we moan about 'elf and safety, what I saw there was quite shocking.

[scenario8]

croyde said:

Awful news. I worked in Doha last year and I know we moan about 'elf and safety, what I saw there was quite shocking.

Eid in New Delhi. Effing unbelievably dangerous firework markets. Boxes upon boxes of explosives. Everyone smoking. Near constant shouting/screaming and fireworks going off "to draw in punters", thousands crammed in tight alleyways. Then of course at night they all light huge boxes of the things and chuck them about/from motorbikes/cars. Thank God for the protection of our guides and the respect we appeared to be granted just by being European looking.

And the roads?

Health and safety in India.

You know you're alive.

[Dixie68]

Is that the mall that used to have a huge shopping trolley sculpture outside?

[GTIR]

I know a lot of people who spend six months in Dubai and six months here (horse racing) and they all "love it". Not sure of its because they've no choice but they always seem to be sad coming home.

I can 100% say I'd never want to go there.

[greenrat]

Mattt said:

Oh for sure there are advantages to living in the Middle East, and the place often gets a bad wrap in the UK press.

Incidents like this remind you that behind the glitz and gold, there are still real problems here that are not being addressed.

Stuck in a hotel room in Dubai, waiting for the local politics to settle long enough so that I can spend three days touring the scorching deserts of Abu Dhabi looking at pipelines, before returning to the nightly teargas and petrol bombs of Bahrain. What's not to love about the ME?

My thoughts, however, are with all the affected families in Doha.
Allahu Akbar

[Mattt]

Three of the children that died were triplets from New Zealand, I can't imagine what the parents of them (or any of the children) are going through.

The Mother of the triplets used to post videos on Youtube - choked me to see:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kT5qe2zQkBk

[croyde]