Karachi
A cooking oil factory in Shershah in the SITE area was gutted by a fierce fire, which broke out in the filling department in the basement of the building in the wee hours of Saturday.
According to details, the fire which erupted at 2 am in the morning was fuelled by hundreds of tonnes of raw and processed cooking oil stocked in the mill.
It took 13-hours for 34 fire tenders from KMC, KPT, DHA and Pakistan Navy to battle the inferno at the Meezan factory, which had turned into a third degree blaze.
Two fire browsers and a snorkel ladder from fire brigade also took part in the extinguishing operation.
Attendance of employees was thin due to the time of the incident. No casualty has been reported.
However, four firemen were injured trying to enter the suffocating smoke-filled building. The rescuers were shifted to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for medical treatment.
The process of cooling is now underway.
Police and other law-enforcement agencies cordoned-off the factory.
Governor Sindh Dr Ishratul Ebad took notice of the inferno and instructed the relevant department to take appropriate steps to control the situation.
Administrator KMC Mohammad Hussain Syed was also present at the site near Paracha Chowk. He warned that the oil tanks inside the burning factory could explode any time, and hence, issued orders to vacate the nearby factories.
A spokesman of Pakistan Rangers Sindh said their personnel acted swiftly to avert a major catastrophe by taking control of the situation.
Rangers established a control room to coordinate rescue efforts, guide fire tenders, allocate space for media and evacuate the workers stranded inside the factory. Due to their timely initiative and concentrated efforts, no loss of human life occurred.
A major factory fire had occurred on September 11 in Baldia Town, which claimed live of nearly 300 people. Such dreadful incidents demonstrate poor safety measures undertaken by owners to guard against such tragedies.
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