Bergen municipality’s director of housing management confirms this TV 2.
14 people were evacuated on Monday evening when a fire broke out in the block of flats with 16 apartments in Birkelundsbakken on Natland in Bergen.
On 4 May 2022, the municipality issued a tender in which a price was requested for residential sprinklers of 63 apartments, among them the block at Natland. The work was supposed to be completed in October 2022. That did not happen.
– No, because we brought in a company that mightn’t keep up the progress and had to liquidate, says director Bjarte Høysæter in the agency for housing management.
When asked if the fire would have had a less explosive course with sprinkling, he replies:
– Most likely. But we don’t know how the fire started, says Høysæter and emphasizes that the investigation has only just begun.
The housing block is municipal. A similar block a few kilometers away was completely damaged in a fire in the summer of 2021. This is thus the second time in three years that the municipality has experienced a major fire in one of its blocks of flats.
After the fire in 2021, it was pointed out that there are a number of similar apartment blocks with several floors, with wooden facades and balconies, in the municipality. That was the reason why the sprinkling of the apartments was put out to tender.
A new supplier is now planning sprinkling, says Høysæter.
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2024-05-02 11:48:16