Collapse of the Beit al Ajaib

Yesterday evening we had just watched the BBC 24-hour news when a trailer for the Travel Show, the programme to follow, came on. Its main item, about Zanzibar, mentioned the collapse of....

....part of the Beit al Ajaib, the House of Wonders, the building which had been used by the British administration of Zanzibar in my mother's time. I was deeply shocked - I had heard nothing about it. It happened some time ago, on Christmas Day 2020. Half of each of two sides of the building fell, killing two people and injuring others.

This is the Beit as we saw it when we visited Stone Town in 2012. My mother's office was behind the window below the tower....

....which housed the lookout for ships approaching the harbour. Tragically, the tower and, presumably....

....my mother's office, with its lovely wood-panelled walls, was part of the collapse.

I am not surprised part of the palace fell down. This was the state of the balcony outside my mother's office in 2012 and, although the government of Oman had become involved in restoration work at the time of the tragedy, it was probably already too late.