120905 Fire kills 52 in Indian factory
India Sep 05 2012 “Building” “Factories”
Dead : dead more than 10 Burnout : 1 to 29 Injured : injured more than 10
Web Source: The Daily Star
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=248566
Date: 6 September, 2012
Country: India
Fire kills 52 in Indian factory
Updated:2012-09-06
At least 52 people were charred to death and 50 injured yesterday in a devastating fire that raged through a fireworks factory on the outskirts of Sivakasi in the southern state of Tamil Nadu.
The toll might go up as several persons were still feared trapped under the debris, police and fire brigade said, as the blaze was doused by the evening amid intermittent explosions.
Officials said the bodies had been accounted for from hospitals at Sattur (16), Virudhunagar (13), Sivakasi (21). Two others died on way to a hospital in Madurai.
Almost all those killed were workers, with some persons, who rushed inside the factory complex to try and rescue those trapped inside, also falling victim to the blaze, they said.
The tragedy struck when workers were engaged in mixing chemicals for fancy fireworks. The blaze gutted all 48 sheds located in the premises of Omshakthi fireworks factory, police and fire officials said.
They said the entire production had been stored in a godown against official advice.
Fire officials said that due to a variety of chemicals used in pyrotechnics crackers, there was thick and suffocating smoke, making their task difficult to enter the factory. The smoke could be seen 1.5 km away from the spot.
A factory official said 300 persons were at work at the unit at the time of the incident.
In October 2009, 32 people, most of them Deepavali festival shoppers, were killed at a cracker godown fire in Pallipattu in Tiruvallur district of Tamil Nadu.