Posted by Ijendu Iheaka, Abia on
A drama of the absurd took place on Monday evening at Ozuakoli Road in Umuahia as a bungalow on 2, Kano Street was being razed by fire while irate youths busied themselves pelting fire fighters with stones and sachets of pure water.
A drama of the absurd took place on Monday evening at Ozuakoli Road in Umuahia as a bungalow on 2, Kano Street was being razed by fire while irate youths busied themselves pelting fire fighters with stones and sachets of pure water.
The Commanding Officer of the Umuahia Fire Service Station, Mr. Christopher Nwachi, on Tuesday confirmed that the driver of the fire tendering vehicle was injured.
He also refuted the allegation that the boys fought his men because they went to the scene without water.
He wondered how a fire service station could go for an intense fire fighting operation without water.
Eye witnesses told our reporter that immediately the fire started people living on the street began to telephone the fire service in Umuahia but it took about one hour from the time the fire servicemen were alerted of the fire before they finally came.
This our reporter gathered was what irked the youth who have converged at the scene of the fire to help scale it down to attack the fire fighters for not heeding the call on time.
Twice the fire fighters appeared at the scene and twice they were forced out of the place due to the angry disposition and resultant mob action of the youth at the scene of the unfortunate incident.
While the fire fighters left, the fire as if on a revenge mission increased its intensity gulping everything that would have remained if the boys had allowed the fire service men to stay and work.
While some young men made frantic efforts to quench the fire using bags of sachet water and water fetched from nearby boreholes, the fire did not die down until it had razed the whole house down.
A young man who was among the team which fought the fire had a deep cut on his head from suspected pieces of broken bottle thje irate youth threw on the fire fighters which made him to bleed profusely leading to his hospitalisation.
Eye witnesses said that the fire began from the room of two young brothers who are transporters living in the house.
However a member of the yard said that at the moment when the house was consumed by fire the boys had packed their things away from the house but were still using the place for a purpose not known.
, when they eventually arrived with their fire fighting equipment, some of the young men present at the scene, angry that the fire fighters have not responded quickly decided to haul sachet water and bits of stones at the men who hurriedly scampered away for the safety of their lives and their equipment.
It took them some time to get their act together and come to the scene.
The Punch, Wednesday, April 20, 2005