Fire safety warning after construction worker deaths

Safety procedures are key to avoiding site fatalities, Dubai Police say

Dubai Police are urging construction workers to follow safety procedures after highlighting two deaths this year. Dubai Civil Defence
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Dubai Police have issued a construction site safety warning after two workers were killed.

The force is calling on companies and employees to ensure they follow safety procedures after a worker died after receiving an electric shock while installing wiring. A second worker was killed while fitting cables into lamps.

Both incidents took place in the first six months of this year.

Police say they dealt with 319 fires, including at villas, apartments, construction sites and cars, between January and the end of June.

The incidents have been investigated by the forensic science and criminology department.

Major Mohammed Al Qasem, head of the police forensic engineering section, said: "An Asian construction worker died of electric shock while installing wires to a solar power plant. Another man died in Mina Rashid while installing cables to lamps without following safety procedures."

Police also revealed that five per cent of fires in Dubai in the first half of the year were started deliberately.

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They include a driver who set fire to a car that belonged to his friend after a row between the two. The blaze spread  to 10 other vehicles.

In another case, a man started a fire at a friend's family home in International City.

“A man started a fire in the door of an apartment that belonged to his friend’s family. He started the fire after he had an argument with his friend,” said Maj Al Qasem.

Car fires accounted for about 40 per cent of the incidents emergency services responded to in the first six months of the year, many due to technical faults with the vehicles.