1 dead, 1 severely burnt after shed with petro-chem products catches fire

PUNE One person is dead, while one sustained severe burn injuries, after a shed with petro-chemical products caught fire on Sunday morning

PUNE One person is dead, while one sustained severe burn injuries, after a shed with petro-chemical products caught fire on Sunday morning. Fire brigade officials needed one-and-a-half hour to douse the fire, according to an official. The incident happened in Kopare gaon, Uttam nagar.

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The deceased have been identified as Brijesh KEshavnagarayn Sahani (21), and the injured man is Sanjay Rampreet Sahani (37). Sahani owned and ran a welding and painting business, according to said senior police inspector Vaishali Chandgude of Uttam nagar police station. They were both natives of Uttar Pradesh.

The two were rushed to Sassoon General Hospital while the fire brigade department doused the fire. While the 21-year-old died of burn injuries, the other man is undergoing treatment for burns.

“They both lived in that shed. They owned and ran a painting and welding business. The chemical is suspected to be thinner used for painting. There were around 8-10 barrels but, we are not sure how many of them contained the liquid. The younger one was a cousin of the injured man. We registered an accidental death report, but now we have begun the process of registering an offence,” said senior PI Chandgude.

The fire that started in a shed, consumed a car that was parked in a garage, and two luxury buses which were parked in an open space adjoining the garage, according to Gajanan Patrudkar, official of the fire department.

“There was a shed of around 1200-1500 square feet in which there were multiple barrels full of petro-chemical liquid. No idea what they were doing with it in that shed or how the fire started. When we reached, the people had already pulled them out and taken them to the hospital. There were two fire tenders from Pune city and two from PMRDA. We needed two tankers. The barrels were individually causing explosions and the shed was blocking our dousing foam. So, we had to pull the fallen roof and then pull out the burning barrels before the fire could be doused completely,” said the fire brigade official.