Hussainsagar boat fire: Standby speed boats saved lives of five people

Hyderabad:The standby speedboat that sailed along with the boat with passengers in it, the one that caught fire on Sunday, and another speedboat kept as standby by the tourism department as a part of safety protocol saved the lives of five people. While five people were shifted to hospital, search is underway to find the 21-year-old S. Ajay, who went missing.

One jetty and a boat on Hussainsagar caught fire and with diesel stocked on the boat, it exploded and went into flames, while the jetty was doused by itself.

While the incident occurred at 9 pm, the boat came to the shore by around 10 pm, according to HYDRAA disaster response force (DRF) teams. With no equipment that could wade through water, police, TSDRFS, HYDRAA and tourism personnel had to wait till the boat that caught fire was ashore.

Two teams from HYDRAA, comprising 12 members, and TSDRFS teams doused the fire completely by midnight. Though the boat came to the shore, the three fire tenders were unable to target precisely because of the distance following which motor pumps were used.

Speaking about Ajay, a HYDRAA official said that search operations were underway.

“The national disaster response force is also going about rescue operations,” he said.