Game lodge up in flames
2005-04-01 11:07
Nairobi - Fire gutted parts of a famed wildlife lodge in Kenya's popular Masai Mara game reserve, causing hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage but injuring none of the scores of guests there, police said on Friday.
About a quarter of the Keekorok Lodge was destroyed overnight on Thursday in the blaze which is believed to have been caused by an electrical short in the kitchen and quickly spread to the restaurant and laundry, they said.
"Nobody was injured because the sleeping quarters are quite isolated, but millions of shillings (hundreds of thousands of dollars, euros) of property was destroyed," regional police commander Joshua Keyum said.
He said the 87 tourists staying at the Keekorok, which was built in the 1950s at the southern end of the park and became a regular stop on East Africa's game-hunting safari circuit, were transferred to neighbouring lodges.
The owners of the 168-guest-capacity lodge said they would rebuild the damaged portions ahead of the tourist high season that starts in July.
Masai Mara, which stretches across Kenya's southern border with Tanzania, is world famous for the annual wildebeest migration. It is a mainstay of the Kenyan tourist sector. - AFP
- SAPA