A fire has razed down buildings in a section of the Mathare area, in Nairobi County.
Videos shared on Wednesday, August 31, showed the fire spreading fast in the heavily congested area.
Most of the affected houses were made of iron sheets and residents could be heard screaming in a bid to alert each other of the incident.
Motorists were advised to use alternative roads after the incident caused a traffic snarl-up along Juja Road.
The county firefighters were yet to respond to the incident at the time of publishing this story.
Accessibility to the area is said to be one of the biggest hindrances to firefighters as passageways are not well defined in the area.
The incident comes barely a year after more than 300 homes in the informal settlements of Mlango Kubwa in Mathare, Nairobi County, went up in flames in the morning hours of October 8, 2021.
Two people died following the incident with authorities fearing that more unaccounted-for victims perished in the inferno.
Residents complained that there was not enough water to put out the fire.
"The fire started at around 2 am and there was a lot of commotion at the time. People were trying to salvage whatever property they could while others were going into countercheck that their children were out of the houses."
"The biggest challenge was the lack of water and so residents started using drainage water," Paul Ng'ang'a Maina, a local leader and political aspirant stated.
Locals urged the county government to intervene and help them with temporary residences as they embark on a journey to rebuild their lives.
