6 fire tenders were enough to douse fire: DG Fire Services
‘People damaged 20 vehicles, snatched equipment from firefighters; traffic movement made it difficult to control the situation’
Srinagar, June 26: The Director General of Fire and Emergency Services G A Bhat Tuesday said had people cooperated with the department, only six fire tenders would have doused the fire of revered Dastgeer sahib (RA) shrine at Khanyar.
He alleged that people damaged 20 fire tenders and snatched equipment from the fire fighters, thus hampering their efforts to extinguish fire and prevent losses.
“At 6:30 am we received a distress phone call that fire has engulfed Dastgeer Sahib (RA) shrine. We sent the fire tenders to the spot within four minutes and fire tenders from headquarters were also dispatched to the spot as well,” Bhat told Rising Kashmir.
He said, people, who had assembled near the shrine, manhandled the firefighters and took the control in their hands.
“The technological imbalance was created in pressure due to negligence of youth, who took fire fighting operations in their hands. After people started lobbing water through pipes, they didn’t attach nozzles with them, which resulted in water loss. Without attaching nozzles to the pipe, water loses its pressure and fails to reach to the target heights,” DG Fire Services said.
Blaming people for creating impediments for firefighters to perform their duties, he said,
“People assembled there said “let the shrine burn” but we won’t allow you (firefighters) to use water of the Damb. Later, the same group took the fire tenders to the Damb for filling water”.
Bhat said had people cooperated with the firefighters, only six fire tenders were enough to control the fire in the shrine. “After the situation was out of our control, we gave a brigade call at 7:0 am. But, unfortunately, people didn’t allow us to control the situation,” he said.
He said they pressed 33 fire tenders into service and most of them had the capacity of around 12000 and 18000 liters having imported rear mounted pump (RMP) of 2270 capacity.
He alleged that people damaged 20 vehicles and injured 20 firefighters. “They also set ablaze one fire tender as well. They also snatched equipments from our men, who were manhandled and beaten”.
DG Fire Services said traffic movement in morning hours created chaos and confusion for them to control the situation. “Traffic men allowed traffic to ply to the area, which created impediments for firefighters to control the situation.”
He said since shrine was made of wood and repeatedly painted with highly inflammable paints, it took less time for the flames to engulf the whole shrine and cause extensive damage.
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