Cylinder blast kills balloon seller in Mumbai

Nadeer Wahab Abdul Pathan was from Uttar Pradesh

A 28-year-old balloon seller was killed after a helium cylinder exploded in Bhandup (West) on Saturday.

Nadeer Wahab Abdul Pathan was from Uttar Pradesh. The police said that the incident took place in a market at Jungle Mungle Road at 7am when he was refilling the cylinder.

Sangeeta Matre, a resident of Jungle Mungle Road, said, “Pathan and his two friends usually came to the market to sell balloons. In the morning, I woke up to the noise of the blast. Scared, I ran into the kitchen to check whether our gas cylinder had exploded.” Pathan’s friends, one of them is hearing and speech impaired, were not injured in the blast as they were standing at a distance form him. However, they were arrested for alleged negligence.

Residents ran out of their homes and saw Pathan’s body, which was flung 200 metres from the spot. The cylinder flew into a mill a kilometer away, said witnesses. He was taken to Agarwal Hospital in Mulund, where he succumbed to his injuries.

The mill owner said, “I was at home when I got a call that a cylinder had crashed into my mill breaking the roof. Fortunately, none of mill workers were present at the time.”

The police said that Pathan was working on a order he had received for Independence Day.

An officer from Bhandup police station said, “Pathan was preparing to blow the tri-colour balloons.”

After getting married three months ago, Pathan had come to the city, said a local resident.

The police have also registered a case of negligence against Pathan.

“We are finding it difficult to get the facts of the incident as one of his colleagues is hearing and speech impaired, while his other colleague is in shock,” said the officer.