2 children, including newborn girl, killed in cylinder blast in Noida slum

Fire official said that six members of the family were rescued and rushed to the District Hospital in Noida Sector 30, from where they were referred to Safdarjung Hospital in Delhi

A 12-year-old boy and a newborn girl aged 12 days were killed after a major fire broke out due to a cylinder blast at a house in a slum Noida Sector 8 around 2.52am on Sunday, officials said adding that six members of the family were rescued and rushed to hospital.

fficials said the fire was limited to only one house in the slum. (Representative ImageO)

“The rescued were rushed to the District Hospital in Sector 30 from where they were referred to Safdarjung Hospital in Delhi,” Noida chief fire officer (CFO) Pradeep Kumar Chaubey said adding that the fire was completely extinguished by the fire tenders and was limited to only one house in the slum.

The deceased boy has been identified as Ahad and the newborn girl was yet to be named. The rescued have been identified as Rizwan (32), Shabana (30), Nisha (20), Shabana’s niece, and Ahad (8), Rizwan’s son.

“Prima facie the cause of the fire seems to be due to leakage in the gas cylinder and consequently it exploded at night. The gas cylinder was found burst with a fisheye hole opening, consistent of a cylinder blast evidence,” said the DFO.

“It seems that the mother of the child had woken up at night to warm some milk on the stove and since the cylinder was leaking, it exploded as soon as the flame was lit for the stove. A loud blast was also heard by the locals,” he added.

Meanwhile, locals alleged that the fire tenders reached the spot after one hour.

“We called up the police and the fire station around 2am when we saw the fire burning the house. However, no body came to the spot. Then, I went to the Phase 1 fire station on a bike to call the fire tenders on spot and even after that it took 15 minutes for them to reach here,” said one of the locals who did not wish to be named.

However, CFO Dubey refuted the allegations. “The fire station is barely five minutes away from the Sector 8 slum. Within 4 minutes of receiving the information, two fire tenders reached the spot though only one fire tender was used to douse the fire,” he said.