[News Today] Deadly apartment fire takes 2 lives

[LEAD]
A deadly fire tore through an apartment in Seoul's Mapo-gu District on Sunday, killing a mother and son and injuring more than ten others. Family members say the blaze may have been sparked by a battery left charging inside. Police and fire officials are carrying out a joint investigation today, to determine the exact cause.

[REPORT]
Red flames and black smoke shoot out of a high-rise apartment building. Firefighters continue spraying water to neutralize the flame.

It was around 8 a.m. Sunday when the fire started at a home on the fourteenth floor of this apartment building.

A man in his twenties was found dead. And his mother in her sixties was found in cardiac arrest. She was transported to a hospital but later died. The father in his sixties suffered burns.

About ten injured residents were taken to hospitals for treatment while roughly 80 others evacuated on their own.

Resident who fled the fire / (VOICE MODIFIED)
I was asleep when I heard siren. I smelled smoke and found out about fire through an announcement. I wetted a towel, walked down stairs.

Although the fire was extinguished two hours later, it had gotten bigger because the fourteenth floor was not equipped with sprinklers.

The apartment was built twenty-seven years ago, when it wasn't obligated for the floors lower than fifteen storeys to be installed with sprinklers.

Kim Seong-mun / Mapo Fire Station
At the time of the building completion, floors sixteenth or higher were obligated to have sprinklers. But the fire was on the 14th floor.

The police and fire authorities started a joint investigation Monday morning to find out the exact cause of the fire.

Investigators plan to look closely into the surviving family member's claim that the fire started when an electric scooter's battery exploded while it was being recharged in a room.

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