Shopping mall fire: Miraculous escape for Nilamel people

With the gastanker tragedy at Chala in Kannur district last week still fresh in theirminds, the people of Nilamel heaved a sigh of relief, as a tragedy many timesthe magnitude of the Chala incident was averted on Monday.

Itwas a close shave for the petrol bunk of Hindustan Petroleum, adjacent to thegutted shopping complex.

The8,500litre underground petrol tank in the bunk was in danger of exploding as itwas close to the gutted bus and motor cycles. The prompt efforts of the Fireand Rescue Services personnel, Kollam Rural Police and local people preventedthe petrol pump and tank from going ablaze.
In the process they were preventing one of the deadliest tragedies in thestate’s history.

Thefire which originated from the shopping complex started consuming the privatebus and three motor bikes parked at the petrol bunk, when the first batch ofFire and Rescue Services personnel led by Leading Fireman T Vinod Kumar fromKadakkal and police personnel from Chadayamangalam and Kadakkal reached thespot.

“Whenthe first unit reached the spot, the private bus and motor bikes were alreadyon fire.The petrol pump and the tanker lorry were dangerously close to the blazingvehicles.
Aqueous film forming foams (AFFF) was sprayed over the petrol tanks to preventthe fire from spreading to fuel storages of the pump. Thepetrol-laden lorry and another empty petrol tanker lorry were immediatelydriven away to safety,” B Byju, Station Officer of the Kadakkal Fire Stationtold ‘Express’.

Kadakkal SI Suneesh said that the initial effort was to prevent the fire fromspreading to the petrol pump rather than dousing the fire.

“Hadthe fire spread to the fuel tanks, the town would have been reduced to ashes.It was miraculous that the fire did not spread to the underground petrol tank thatwas dangerously close to the gutted private bus,” he said.

Firetenders from Punalur, Varkala, Attingal, Chenkalchoola and Kadakkal werepressed into service. Top officers of the Fire and Rescue Services and Policereached the spot to supervise the operations.

KollamRural SP K B Balachandran, Punalur DySP John Kutty K L, Fire and RescueServices Divisional Officer R Prasad, District Fire Officer J Sujith Kumar,Kadakkal CI Ramesh Kumar P V, Kottarakkara CI G D Vijayakumar, Ezhukone C ISadan K, Chadayamanagalam SI  ShajaKumar, Kadakkal SI Suneesh reached the spot and led the operations.

HomeMinister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan and Mullakkara Ratnakaran MLA, visited thespot later in the day.