Building catches fire on Dubai’s manmade palm island

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - A fire broke out on Sunday in a building under construction on Dubai’s iconic Palm Jumeirah resort island, injuring at least three people and sending clouds of smoke towering over the city’s beachfront neighbourhoods. The fire started in the basement of an unfinished eight-story building amid a cluster of apartment towers on the trunk of the manmade Gulf island that is shaped like a date palm tree.

By (AP)

Published: Sun 6 May 2007, 9:10 PM

Last updated: Sun 5 Apr 2015, 4:20 AM

Hundreds of labourers were evacuated from the scene. One construction worker was hospitalised and two others treated at the scene for smoke inhalation, officials said. Work halted on building sites across the island, which began opening its newly built luxury mansions to residents this year.

State-owned developer Nakheel said in a statement that the fire ignited building materials on the site. Firefighters extinguished the blaze in about two hours.

The 31-square-kilometer (12-square-mile) island group has about 14,000 laborers building an offshore neighbourhood that will house more than 100,000 residents and workers when finished by 2011.

The Palm Jumeirah is part of a US$14 billion (Ð10.32 billion) project to build several manmade islands in what’s billed as the largest land-reclamation project in the world, involving the hauling of millions of tons of Gulf sand and quarried rock.

Dubai’s government expects the Palm Jumeirah to become a signature tourist attraction, bringing in as many as 20,000 daily visitors.

The island’s trunk section, its 17 ¢fronds” and its outer crescent are studded with thousands of homes and apartments, most of which are still under construction. Britons and other Europeans have bought a large portion of the homes as vacation properties.

Also being built is the Trump Tower and Hotel, developed by New York-based Donald Trump, and the 1,500-room Atlantis Hotel by South Africa and Dubai-owned Kerzner International. The hotel will be similar to its Atlantis hotel in The Bahamas.