Seventeen boys dead in Kenyan school dormitory fire

A fire ripped through a primary school dormitory in central Kenya and killed 17 boys, authorities said on Friday.

The fire broke out in the boys' dormitory in Nyeri county at around midnight on Thursday. At least 14 children were taken to hospital with injuries.

The cause of the fire at the boarding school is not yet known.

The number of victims could be even higher because it was initially unclear how many of the 156 pupils were in the building at the time of the fire, and several are presumed to have fled the site in panic.

"We are trying to clarify the whereabouts of every child," said a representative of the Ministry of Education. All children should also be examined in hospital as a precautionary measure before they are allowed to go home.

Many Kenyan children attend boarding schools, particularly in rural areas, because the nearest school are often too far away from their homes to be reached in one day.

There have been many fatal fires at such schools, where a large number of children often share a room. Regulations were tightened in response to those incidents, with schools not being allowed to lock dormitories, and having to create clearly recognizable evacuation routes for emergencies.