Fire-fighting a tall order for Delhi high-rises

Delhi is playing with fire. A thousand odd high-rises in the Capital have just one sky ladder (hydraulic fire tender), and that, too, can't go higher than 12 floors (36 mts).

Delhi is playing with fire. A thousand odd high-rises in the Capital have just one sky ladder (hydraulic fire tender), and that, too, can't go higher than 12 floors (36 mts).

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Fire-fighting and evacuation can pose a problem in case of an accident.

An audit of the Wednesday's mock drill, held to check preparedness in case of a natural disaster, by the army brought the glaring gap to light.

"It pointed out that Delhi Fire Services has one hydraulic fire tender while the number of high-rises is in thousands," said Delhi Lt Gov Tejinder Khanna, who got the report on Thursday.

"There is a great need to procure more such fire tenders at the earliest," said Khanna.

A number of buildings have structural flaws and a safety audit should be done, says the audit report. Khanna said the Municipal Corporation of Delhi was asked to create a consultancy wing for all those interested in getting the building faults rectified.

"The wing will be supported by IIT-Delhi (Indian Institute of Technology) and Delhi Technical University experts," he said.