NAIROBI, KENYA – A devastating early-morning fire that swept through a girls’ boarding school dormitory in central Kenya has left 16 young students dead and dozens more wounded, with law enforcement announcing Friday that eight female students have been taken into custody on suspicion of intentionally setting the blaze. Authorities are still working to unpack what led to the tragedy, with investigations ongoing to uncover a clear motive for the attack. The deadly incident has renewed long-simmering concerns over fire safety standards at educational facilities across East Africa, where inadequate infrastructure and emergency preparedness have left schools vulnerable to similar disasters.
According to Kenya’s Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI), the national police department overseeing the case, the eight detained students are suspected of planning and executing the arson attack at Utumishi Girls School, located in central Kenya. The fire broke out on Thursday morning, claiming 16 lives and leaving 79 additional people injured, many of whom were students residing in the destroyed dormitory.
In the immediate aftermath of the blaze, police held 30 students on Thursday for questioning, instructing their parents to leave the campus without their daughters and return for further updates Friday morning. DCI spokesperson John Marete outlined the scope of the ongoing investigation in an official statement, noting that investigators have conducted extensive one-on-one interviews with current students, teaching staff, and other on-site witnesses, while specialist forensic teams work through available closed-circuit camera footage to piece together the timeline of the fire.
“Detectives continue to record statements and analyze all available evidence to reconstruct the sequence of events, establish the full circumstances of the incident, and determine the motive,” Marete added, confirming that no clear motive has been confirmed as of Friday.
As investigations moved forward, many parents remained in a state of uncertainty Friday, lingering on the school campus with no official timeline for when the remaining students held for questioning would be released. One parent, who requested anonymity out of fear that her daughter could face retaliation for her mother speaking out, told the Associated Press that families have been left completely in the dark about the case. “We have not even been told about the eight that police have arrested,” she said. “We are just here and no one is giving us any information.”
The bodies of the 16 deceased students were transferred to a government hospital morgue Thursday, where forensic teams are currently conducting DNA testing to formally confirm their identities before they can be released to family members.
Deadly fires at educational institutions have been a persistent source of alarm for education officials across East Africa for years. Most schools in the region are built with overcrowded dormitories and classroom facilities, and very few have access to basic firefighting equipment or formal emergency evacuation plans. Past school fires have been linked to both accidental causes like faulty electrical wiring and intentional acts, often tied to student grievances over strict disciplinary policies or other institutional conflicts.