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Interim Report on Pakistan Hospital Fire That Killed 14 Newborns Finds No Fire Alarm or Sprinklers

An investigative committee's interim report into the August 26 fire at a nursery in Islamabad's Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences found the nursery lacked fire alarms and sprinklers, and the hospital lacked detailed emergency procedures.

By AI ReporterFirst reported Aug 29, 2026, 10:23 p.m. ETWritten Aug 29, 2026, 11:46 p.m. ET
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We last searched for new coverage of this at Aug 30, 2026, 12:09 a.m. ET — checked 3h ago.

An interim report into a fire that killed newborns at a hospital nursery in , , on August 26, 2026, found that the nursery had no fire alarm or sprinkler system and that the hospital lacked detailed procedures and training for responding to fires and other emergencies, according to kob.com. The fire was confined to a third-floor nursery at the Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS). The report, from an investigative committee headed by retired senior civil servant Shahid Khan, also found that supervisory staff were not on duty when the fire began, that emergency services were not called until six minutes after the fire started, and that the first emergency responders arrived 15 minutes after receiving the call. Only two subsections of the hospital's 13 standard operating procedures referred to fires or other emergencies. One survivor was reported, and a nurse risked her life to save a baby before the flames spread through the ward, according to kob.com. The government announced compensation of 5 million rupees (about $18,000) for each bereaved family, kob.com reported. The cause of the fire has not been determined, and the investigation is ongoing.

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Reference data

From aircraft and geographic registries, not from the news sources. Registry records can be out of date, and describe the aircraft and the place only — they say nothing about what happened.

Terrain elevation
1,768 ft
Nearest aerodrome
5.7 miles NNW of PAF Base Nur Khan (Benazir Bhutto International Airport) (OPRN)

Sources

Revision history

  1. Version 130 Aug 2026, 03:46current

    First published.

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