VIDEOS: 14 infants killed in Islamabad hospital fire

People at the scene gave conflicting accounts of the cause and rescue, citing possible faults in the air conditioning system or incubators. A replacement firefighter said crews found the northern and western gates locked, set up ladders, broke into the building and carried out the initial rescue, while others said local people did much of the work. “Everyone gives a different timeline, a different version,” journalist Qurrat-ul-Ain Shirazi said.

Accounts also differed on whether the infants’ bodies had been identified. Some people said tags on the infants’ limbs were intact, while others said identification was still in process; a woman at the scene said families “were handed the bodies and hurried away” and that “everything seemed to be happening in a hurry.”

Journalist Farah Rabbani, who reached the site just after 9 a.m. and was among the few reporters who entered the ward, said it was “completely destroyed” and that “floor to ceiling, everything is burnt.” Health Minister Mustafa Kamal, PPP’s Sherry Rehman, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate Allama Raja Nasir Abbas and PPP’s Shahid Khattak visited the scene; Abbas said keeping media out amounted to an attempted coverup.