[imagesource: Ashraf Hendricks / GroundUp]

At 1:30PM yesterday, SANParks released a statement saying that the fire which had raged since Sunday had been “successfully contained”.

We have the heroic efforts of firefighters to thank for that, as well as organisations like Gift of the Givers for coordinating assistance to the displaced UCT students.

The Cape of Good Hope SPCA also has information on how to assist animals that may have been harmed in the fire here.

Sunday’s footage of UCT’s Jagger Library (or Jagger Reading Room) engulfed in flames was shared far and wide, and the heartbreaking task of assessing the damage continues.

Unbelievable — the UCT libraries with priceless rare books is being gutted by the #CapeTownFire (Video from WhatsApp) pic.twitter.com/7RI4dsxD3U

— Kimon de Greef (@kimondegreef) April 18, 2021

Speaking to Business Day yesterday, executive director of libraries at UCT, Ujala Satgoor, detailed some of the damage:

The fire, which apparently started on the roof of the Jagger Library’s cavernous wood-panelled reading room, destroyed about half of works held there, she said. The remaining books, manuscripts and writings on lower floors were saved after five steel doors, triggered as part of the fire alarm system, rolled into place and prevented the fire spreading.

But that was not before large parts of the African Studies monographed collection of published books was destroyed, as well as rare 19th-century dictionaries from around the continent and a valuable African DVD films collection of about 3,500 films.

“We were very fortunate to digitise the VHS films and had them stored as DVDs, but because of copyright we could not replicate,” Satgoor said, adding that the process of digitisation had helped preserve other manuscripts.

The fireproofing measures were installed during Dr Max Price’s tenure as vice-chancellor.

Satgoor said that she and others had watched, “in horror and helplessness as this elegant and historical library” burnt.

The library was built in the 1930s, and is named after John William Jagger, an English-born businessman and politician who served in the cabinet of Prime Minister Jan Smuts.

This footage, shot two days ago, shows the extent of the damage:

Whilst Satgoor requested that the public “refrain from speculation and conjecture” regarding the extent of what has been lost in the blaze, the scope of what was housed in the library means that any damage sustained is disastrous

This from GroundUp:

The library holds diverse historical records from across society, from activist pamphlets to corporate minutes, original music manuscripts to graduate theses, many of them recording the voices of everyday South Africans that may be found nowhere else. A trove of material documenting the struggle for AIDS medicines is in the library.

UCT’s special collections and African studies collections are vast and varied. They include anti-apartheid work by Neville Alexander, IB Tabata, Ruth and Jack Simons, to the papers of Wilhelm Bleek, a linguist and ethnologist whose records of the San and Khoisan peoples are listed in Unesco’s Memory of the World Register.

Calls have gone out to researchers to archive and digitise any materials they may have copied, photographed, or recorded at the library.

Any materials can be uploaded here.

In total, including the library, six buildings on the UCT campus were either damaged or destroyed.

The Daily Maverick reports that whilst there hasn’t been confirmation given on the names of the five other buildings, they include Smuts Hall residence, Fuller Hall residence, and the HW Pearson Building.

Christelle Colman, a spokesperson for Old Mutual Insure, estimated that insurance claims from UCT related to the fire could hit the R1 billion mark.

Vice-Chancellor Mamokgethi Phakeng, in conversation with eNCA, said the damage was estimated at around R500 million, although you can’t put a price on the lost books, documents, and research.

Satgoor says they hope to have cleared all of the material from the library by the end of today, in order to prevent mould from further damaging any books and materials.

[sources:busday&groundup&dailymav]