Report: 274 dead in Paraguay market fire

Fire roared through a multilevel supermarket on the outskirts of Asuncion, the Paraguayan capital Sunday, causing at least one floor to collapse, and a television station reported that at least 274 people died and dozens more were injured.

The fire broke out at the Ycua Bolanos supermarket while it was crowded with Sunday midday shoppers, sweeping through the multilevel complex that houses a food court, supermarket, and parking garage.

Paraguay's Channel 9 reported that 274 bodies had been recovered, citing rescue workers and police accounts. The government had no official toll of deaths and injuries hours after the fire erupted.

Officials were still trying to determine the cause of the fire as the building continued smoldering after nightfall.

Badly burned bodies, their limbs twisted, were hustled off on stretchers. Public officials appealed for blood donations and medical supplies as hospitals went on emergency staffing throughout the capital of this small, impoverished South American nation.

Rescue workers wearing masks helped remove victims on stretchers as riot police kept back a growing crowd. The victims included a baby and a pregnant woman.

Police at hospitals held back sobbing relatives as victims, some covered in foil blankets, were rushed into emergency rooms on stretchers.

Interior Minister Orlando Fiorotto ordered off-duty police and firefighters to the scene and urged hospitals to prepare for the injured. An Associated Press photographer at the scene said hundreds of neighbors living nearby rushed to the scene, helping carry bodies from the building as firefighters held water hoses. Dozens of relatives crowded outside and cried as bodies were pulled out.

Hundreds of rescue workers, bystanders and relatives stood outside the shopping complex, located in an Asuncion suburb. Brown smoke hung in the air for hours afterward.

Source: CD/Agencies