The incidence of fire in the city's high-rise buildings increased by 53.8 per cent over the same period last year, according to the Shanghai Firefighting Bureau, Shanghai Youth Daily reports.

In some cases, the property management company had switched off a building's automatic fire hydrant or fire truck ladders were not tall enough to scale the skyscrapers, keeping firefighters from bringing blazes under control in a timely manner.

According to the bureau, 148 fires occurred in tall residential blocks in the first nine months of the year, accounting for 58.5 per cent of the total fires in high-rise buildings.

Some property companies shut off automatic fire hydrants, which should remain on 24 hours a day, to save on costs.

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