Chennai: In separate incidents of fire on Friday, the canteen of an aided school in Royapettah was gutted in an LPG leak triggering a cylinder blast and an automobile spare parts shop. A distress call was made at around 6 am from CSI Monahan Girls HSS campus located on Peters Road, Royapettah. An old building, which was used as pantry-cum-kitchen of the school mess was on fire when the fire brigade turned up at the spot few minutes later.
After an ordeal of 30 minutes, the fire was controlled and put out by fire tenders from Triplicane, Teynampet, and Egmore. The field officer M. Sagayanathan (Station Fire Officer- Koyambedu) observed that the fire ravaged the entire facility, as a lot of wood was present in the old tiled-roof building. Preliminary investigations revealed that the workers who had used three gas cylinders on Thursday had failed to notice the leak through the day. “The gas had built up through the night resulting in the blaze. It is fortunate that the fire accident occurred ahead of the working hours,” said a police official.
The other fire accident was reported in an automobile spare parts shop located on Ellis Road. The early morning fire charred two-wheeler spare parts. Three fire tenders from Triplicane, Egmore and Vepery were pressed into service and firemen prevented the flames from spreading to other buildings in the narrow lane. Preliminary investigations revealed that the fire was sparked by an electrical short-circuit at the shop. An estimated loss of '20 lakhs may have been incurred in the accident. No casualty was reported here as well. Cases were registered in both incidents.
