House owners urged to install automatic iron grill

House owners have been urged to install automatic iron grilles using battery power so that windows and doors can easily be opened for quick exit in case of a fire.

Fire and Rescue Department director-general Datuk Wan Mohd Nor Ibrahim said with the automatic grilles, one only needed to press a button to open them.

"We have been advising house owners to install such grilles in case of fire and to prevent crime," he said when contacted yesterday.

He was commenting on a fire tragedy at a two-storey bungalow in Taiping, Perak yesterday which killed a couple, their son and an Indonesian maid when all victims died of suffocation.

Mohd Hakimi Zubair, 40, corporate affairs director with the Royal Bank of Scotland in Kuala Lumpur, his wife Leiha Sahak, 40, their son Ahmad Faris, 3, and maid known as Rizki were killed in the fire.