Blaze rips through historical collections at Jakarta's maritime museum
Jakarta's Bahari Museum is housed in old Dutch East India Company warehouses used to store expensive spices, tea and coffee.
Tuesday 16 January 2018 09:21, UK
A huge fire has caused extensive damage to Jakarta's heritage maritime museum housed in Dutch colonial warehouses.
Thick black smoke was seen billowing out of the burning 17th Century structure.
Jakarta's fire department said there were no casualties, with employees and visitors evacuated.
The blaze destroyed models of Dutch East India Company ships, traditional Indonesian vessels and a newly installed diorama showing the history of World War II in the Java Sea.
The Bahari Museum buildings used to be warehouses owned by the Dutch East India Company to store expensive spices and other commodities, including tea and coffee.
Three decades after Indonesia declared independence from the Dutch in 1949, the buildings were turned into a museum displaying nautical vessels, maps and tools used across the more than 17,000 island archipelago.
The Indonesian Heritage Society said it was too early to assess the scale of damage to the museum's structure.
"It's certainly a great loss not only because of the contents of the museum but because of the historic nature of the building and the whole Old Town area," said Isla Winarto, president of the organisation.
"We hope the museum can be restored to its original glory in the not too distant future."
The cause of the fire is not yet known.
The fire comes a day after a mezzanine floor in the Jakarta Stock Exchange collapsed, injuring 73 people, mostly visiting college students.