20190918 Fire ‘travels’ 250metre on drain, engulfs Gandhi ashram in Muzaffarnagar
India Sep 18 2019 “Other”
Dead : dead 0 or unknown Burnout : 0 or unknown Injured : injured 0 or unknown
Fire ‘travels’ 250metre on drain, engulfs Gandhi ashram in Muzaffarnagar
Updated: 2019–09–18
MEERUT: At first, there was oil on the water. Then someone, out of curiosity or by mistake, threw a burning matchstick on it. What happened next was beyond belief as over 250-metre stretch of a drain in UP’s Muzaffarnagar was on fire, sending shockwaves in the region and forcing the fire department to launch an operation to tame the flame. Soon it engulfed parts of Gandhi ashram.
It all started on Monday morning when huge amount of kerosene oil leaked from a godown and found its way to a nearby drain along Circular Road in Muzaffarnagar.
Muzaffarnagar’s chief fire officer Ramashankar Tiwari said, “Oil leaked from kerosene oil godown to a drain here. Since oil is lighter than the water, it started floating. And, in all likeliness, a matchstick that might have been thrown by a smoker here put the drain on fire. A team of firemen reached the spot and blocked the flow of oil in the drain and doused it by foam chemical.”
A tragedy was averted as firemen doused the blaze just before it reached two petrol pumps on the opposite sides of a road.
The owners of the godown were called by district administration. However, they failed to turn up. An investigation has been ordered into to find out the reason behind the leakage.
“The fire spread at least for 250metre in the drain. The windows of the Gandhi ashram were gutted in it. A limousine which is used to ferry newly-married couple and two other vehicles were gutted. Luckily, we were able to douse the fire before it could spread to the petrol pumps which are situated on both sides of the road here” said Tiwari.
Web Source: The Times of India