It may take time to determine what started an apartment fire in Johannesburg early Thursday morning and why more than 70 people died.
But witness accounts, imagery of the blaze and a visit to the site in May indicate that the five-story building had a litany of major safety issues that made it vulnerable to a deadly fire.
Preliminary evidence suggests the fire started on the ground floor, a local official said, and trapped many residents behind locked gates as it spread.
While precise origin of the fire is unknown, some of the earliest flames were spotted in a courtyard behind the building where people were living.
Locations:
Johannesburg