Nagpur: In a curious incident, a fire broke out suddenly in a nallah flowing adjacent to Govindas Rawal Gujarati High School, Santra Market Railway Colony in Prabhag 19 on Tuesday. The 18-20 foot flames engulfed nearby trees, bushes as well as drying clothes of nearby residents. However, no loss of life was reported.
Timely arrival of a team of Fire Brigade firefighters prevented the fire from spreading to other areas.
According to senior BJP Corporator Dayashankar Tiwari, he received a phone call from a person named Avinash Phatak informing him about the eruption of fire in the nallah. When he reached the spot, the Fire Brigade personnel were already busy in dousing the fire. The water flowing from Railway Station platforms is released in the nallah passing through between the Gujarati School and Railway Colony. The reason for breaking out the fire could be due to petroleum products being flowed along with water.
Alertness on the part of nearby residents and timely arrival of Fire Brigade team brought the fire under control before it could spread to platforms in the Railway Station. As the fire was due to presence of petroleum products, the firefighters used foam to douse the flames. The Fire Brigade team comprised of Anil Gale of Ganjipeth Station, Bhagwan Wagh of Cotton Market Station, and Rajendra Dubey of Fire Brigade Headquarters and other personnel.
The firefighters first doused the fire in the open nallah and area adjacent to scooter stand near Railway Station. The fire in the central part of the nallah was doused thereafter. Since the nallah was underground, the fire personnel had to face difficulties in fighting the fire.
Tiwari later informed the Municipal Commissioner about the fire. The Chief Fire Officer Rajendra Uchke and NMC Health Officer Dr Pradeep Dasarwar visited the spot jointly and asked the Railway officials to be alert and ensure no fire incident occurs in future. It was found that there was leakage of petroleum products near Platform No. 6 and the inflammable material was flowing along with water.
Since the Railway lacked their own firefighting machinery, it has to depend on NMC’s Fire Brigade for firefighting exercise.
