The Nation Newspaper

Tag: fire

  • Traders lose millions in Aba inferno

    Traders in  Nkwo Ngwa market in Aba South Local Government Area of Abia State have lost goods worth millions of naira in a midnight fire that engulfed the market.

    While police and other agencies have launched investigation to unravel the cause of the fire incident, sources at the market told our reporter that they suspected that it  was as a result of the carelessness of a food vendor who couldn’t properly put out fire in her shop before closing for the day.

    Another source has it that the fire started in a wood processing factory in the market.

    Our reporter who visited the market on Sunday in the company of Abia State Commissioner of Police, Chris Ezike gathered that over 100 shops were engulfed in the inferno.

    It was learnt that the fire incident which started at about 8pm lasted several hours before it could be put out by some of the callers to the scene and through the efforts of personnel of the State Fire Service who were on hand to stop the fire from spreading to other parts of the market.

    Some of the affected traders who could not hold back their tears said that their loss run into millions and lamented the bad situation of the road leading to the market which prevented the Fire Servicemen from arriving the scene in record time, causing them to suffer more damage.

    Prince Okechukwu Lawrence, chairman of the market confirmed that there was no loss of live, but regretted the level of damage suffered by the traders as a result of the inferno.

    Lawrence while debunking that the traders attacked personnel of the fire service, disclosed that hoodlums capitalized on the incident to loot from other shop owners in the market.

    He appealed to Abia State governor, Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu to come to their aid as many of them have lost their means of livelihood through the inferno.

    In his speech, the Commissioner of Police in the state who said that he was on a sympathy visit and to have firsthand information of the incident, called on the traders to be calm and peaceful as police had already launched investigation into the matter.

    Ezike added that they have started compiling the names of the affected traders with the intention of forwarding same to the state government for necessary actions to be taken.

    The Senior Special Adviser to Abia State Governor on Security, Captain Awa Udensi (rtd) who was also at the scene expressed the regret over the loss, adding that the state government would see ways of coming to the assistance of the affected victims.

    Awa assured the traders that their plight would be tabled to the Governor of the state as soon as he (Ikpeazu) arrives the state from his trip.

    Some residents who spoke to our reporter described the incident as unfortunate, stressing that they were all afraid that the damage could be much going by the rage of the inferno.

    They thanked the commissioner of police for showing concern and prayed that efforts would be put in place to check a recurrence of such ugly incident.

  • Fire destroys 77 shops in Kano market

    The Kano State Fire Service said fire has destroyed 77 temporary shops at Kasuwar Kurmi (‘Yan Gumama) Market in Kano.

    The Spokesman of the State Fire Service, Alhaji Saidu Mohammed told News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Kano on Sunday that 70 of the shops were razed down completely.

    “we received a distress call early hours of (Sunday morning) at about 07:35 a.m from one Aliyu Ibrahim that there was fire outbreak at the market.

    ”On receiving the information, we quickly sent some of our personnel and fire fighting vehicle to the scene of the incident at about 07: 43 a.m to quench the fire so as not to affect other shops,“ he said.

    The spokesman said that 70 of the shops were completely razed down while seven shops were saved due to the quick intervention of the firemen.

    He advised traders at the market and other residents to be more careful and desist from using instruments capable of triggering fire as a way of guarding against future occurrence during this dry season.

    Mohammed also advised the people to keep fire buckets, blankets and extinguishers that would enable them curtail the fire before calling on the fire service.

    Mohammed said the cause of the fire is still under investigation. (NAN)

  • Millions gone as fire razes chemical firm in Ondo

    Property valued at over N100 million were razed at the weekend at a chemical company on the premises of Ondo State Trade Fair complex in Akure, the state capital.

    The company was said to have stocked chemicals for production of paints, wood finishes, thinner lacquer and others.

    An eyewitness Kolawole Bello said the fire started around 10 p.m on Friday night following a power surge, thereby igniting the chemicals and equipment in the company.

    According to him, the high voltage supplied by the electricity company resulted in the inferno, but the timely response of firemen saved the trade fair complex from burning.

    Bello, who blamed the power surge for the fire, said: “We noticed the fire around 10 p.m and we called the attention of the owner of the factory and firemen.”

    He added: “The firemen responded promptly but the fire had wreaked havoc. The chemicals were powerful, and the company had gone up in flames before they arrived the scene.”

    The firm owner, Bisi Ogungbemi, said he received a call from the factory and called the firefighters who he said promptly responded.

    He said the company just received a new stock of about N50 million.

    The company chief blamed the incident on the power surge and called for government help.

    Ogungbemi said: “This is our only source of livelihood and we have about 20 able-bodied men working with us. We want to appeal to the state government to look into our plight and help us.

    “We don’t want to send these men to the unemployment market again. I am calling on Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu to bail us out, financially.”

    The Commissioner for Works and Infrastructure, Taofeek Abdulsaalam, who visited the scene, said preliminary investigation indicated that the fire was caused by a power surge.

  • Inferno razes house, kills three siblings in Nasarawa

    An early morning inferno on Saturday in Ado village, Karu Local Government Area Nasarawa State has burnt three children of the same parents to death, the News Agency of Nigeria  reports.

    A correspondent of the NAN in the area reports that the incident, which has thrown residents of the area into mourning, also razed a bungalow.

    The fire started at about 6:30 a.m. but the cause of the fire could not be ascertained as at the time of this report.

    However, an eyewitness, Mr Cambric Ayet who lost property to the fire said: ‘‘My wife was the first person who came out to see heavy smoke coming out of a neighbour’s room and started shouting fire, fire.’’

    The victim said on hearing his wife’s voice, he went out to shout for help and to rescue his co-tenant, who unknown to him was not at home except the children who were sleeping in the room while the inferno was on.

    ‘‘On going to the room, l noticed that it was locked and l thought my neighbour was cooking, locked the room and went out since there was no electricity throughout the night.

    ‘‘It was when we were trying to break the door to have access to the room that we saw our neighbour, (the mother of the children) coming toward the house.

    ‘‘As she saw people and the incident, she started shouting my children, my children; that was when we got to know that three children were inside the room.’’ he said.

    Mr Sunday Ugwa, the father of the deceased children, gave their names as Chimobi, Chinonso and Destiny: three, five and eight yeras.

    He said he was confused when he got the news of the incident through a neighbour.

    Read Also; Fire razes family apartment days to mum’s burial

    Ugwa said, ‘‘My wife explained that she went to buy a recharge card and she was not cooking before she went out; what then could be the source of the fire?

    ‘‘My wife does not cook inside, our kitchen is outside; we don’t use gas to cook because of the children, how come about such fire,?’’ he asked.

    Commenting on the event upon his arrival at the scene, Mr Zaks Wambi, DSP, in charged of New Nyanya Police Station, Karu, described the incident as unfortunate.

    Wambi, who condoled with the victims, advised members of the public to desist from using inferior gas cooking equipment.

    ‘‘We have experienced series of such incidents resulting from keeping gas inside the kitchen to cook which is not proper,“ he said.

    NAN reports that with the approval of the parents of the deceased, their corpses were conveyed in the police van for burial.

  • From frying pan to fire (II)

    •Continued from last week

    Linda and Chioma were best of friends in the hostel when they met at the senate house during registration they were two of a kind.. they both had a passion to excel academically and stand out in their careers and have stable family lives. However, just before their final year graduation, Linda observed the questionable desire in Chioma to travel out of the country at all cost and confronted her.  Chioma reacted strangely with silence and packed her things out of Linda’s room. She later sent Linda a letter instructing her to mind her business. Of course, she did. Chioma eventually traveled abroad without completing her course at the university. This became hot news for the gossips in the institution.

    “Linda, we need to talk oo. Please give me some minutes, I need to quickly drop a suit for a client in this office. I will be back in a jiffy”. In less than ten minutes Chioma returned and the two ladies sat down to gist at a popular restaurant on Tunde Alakija’s street.

    Chioma opened her can of worms as she narrated her ordeal. She packed out of Linda’s room because she was lured by her late boyfriend to travel out with him to Europe through the desert. “Linda, I regret ever making that decision. John persuaded me to drop out of the university and promised to take me to Europe (Italy) where he would secure a high paying job for me so that we would settle down and get married. I was naïve and believed him. He told me not to tell you anything lest you become jealous of me. Linda, I packed out of your room and moved to his..few months later, we embarked on the journey of death..through the deserts. In fact, we were seventeen in number, Kate and Sherifat, those lousy Chemical Engineering students were also on board ..they confided in me that they each paid eight hundred thousand naira to John for the trip. I thought John loved me but later realized he was one of the agents that seek innocent youths to lure them into the ‘Desert’..to be taken to Europe via Libya, and those that are lucky to survive through the horrible journey become commercial sex slaves and “Don Juans”.

    To cut the long story short, John was killed in a shoot-out by opposing cabals in the desert and by divine providence, I was saved and captured by the opposition. However, the military troops of the government in the territory got a security alert and they launched a counterattack, arrested the “terrorists” and deported the captives mainly Nigerians. Chai!.See my life, Linda, I could have been killed, in fact I was raped several times..what have I done to myself? What is my gain after all? “

    Linda held Chioma’s hands firmly as she wiped away her tears..unconsciously counting her blessings that she never had to go through such dreadful experience, her hope was renewed and she encouraged her friend to get up and start again.. “ we can be lifted from the morass of regret we procure through poor choices, if we change our ways”.

    After two months, Linda was appointed as a Media Relations Officer of an international broadcasting organization. What a great reward! In looking at both ladies, you might say that the wild card in their game of life was good fortune- Linda had it: Chioma didn’t- and you might be right. Luck(I call it grace) certainly played some role in how their lives turned out, as it did, does, and will in yours. What I must tell you, though is that their choices eventually became their making and unmaking as it applies. Look closely at the choices each made and how they made it and you’ll see that Linda took a distinct approach to her life, different from Chioma’s. Someone said we make more than three hundred choices every day. The quality of the choices you make determines the quality of life you live. Make a right choice today, don’t be enticed into illegal migration, it is a pathway to sex slavery, kidnapping, organ harvesting, and death.

    Having a desire to travel abroad is not a bad idea but how you go matters, there are numerous opportunities in forms of scholarships, remote working etc. You can contact: The Migrant  Project team for proper counseling. Please call the numbers: 08169229349, 08061637956, 09035136713 or visit- The Migrant Project on Facebook. Remember a right attitude wins always.

  • Fire guts computer firm in Ilupeju

    A firm, Allied Computers in Ilupeju, Lagos,was yesterday gutted by fire.

    The Nation gathered that the fire began around 1:30pm. About seven water trucks were used to fight the fire.

    Among responders on the scene were officials of the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency (LASEMA); Lagos State Neighbourhood Safety Corps (LNSC) and the Police.

    LNSC official told The Nation that they were notified of the inferno around 3:45pm.

    According to him, nobody died, nobody was injured, all workers were rescued by the men of the state fire service.

    “We were notified around 3:45pm. On getting there, we saw the flames coming out of the company, we alerted the fire service,” he said.

    A worker in the neighbouring company simply identified himself as Peter said; “I came to buy something to eat, only to notice that smoke was coming out from some windows of the building. I raised the alarm. Then, the security officer screamed to alert everyone to come down, which they did. I later called the Lagos State Fire Service, and within few minutes, they arrived surprisingly and have been battling to quench the fire,” he said.

  • Millions gone as fire razes Aba market

    •Police arrest six security guards for questioning

    Goods and other property, including textile materials, estimated at millions of naira were destroyed yesterday when a fire gutted the popular Ekeoha/Shopping Centre located between Market Road and Ehi Road, off Aba-Owerri and Ehi roads in Aba, the commercial hub of Abia State.

    It was gathered that six security guards on duty in the area have been arrested and detained at Ndiegoro Police Division.

    Though traders in the affected lines – zones 3 and 6 – could not immediately ascertain the cause of the inferno, sources at the Abia State Fire Service in Aba attributed it to a “wilful” or deliberate act by a suspected arsonist.

    Our reporter, who visited the scene of the fire, noted that the fire affected shops MF 1A and KH 23up, said to belong to Mr. Hillary Asogwa from Nsukka in Enugu State and Mr. Peter from Neni in Anambra State.

    While the shop owners could not speak due to overwhelming emotion, it was gathered that the incident started around 4 a.m and lasted till about 7.30 a.m when fire fighters prevented the inferno from spreading to other shops.

    The suspected arsonist was said to have mistakenly set shop MF 1A on fire, apparently thinking it was the store of the owner of shop KH 23up.

    While shop KH 23up was reportedly stocked with lycra material, shop MF 1A was stocked with lace materials.

    The police were investigating the matter at the time of this report.

    It was learnt that the suspected arsonist broke a glass on top of the shops before setting them ablaze.

    “The shop at MF 1A just offloaded 15 giant bales of lace that were delivered in a 20-feet container, while the shop owner of KH 23up recently brought back some goods, which are yet to be touched.

    “From what happened, the owner of Shop MF 1A was just unfortunate to have suffered such a huge loss. We don’t think that he was the target. He became a victim because his shop is close to the shop of the man in KH 23up. We don’t use electricity here. Tell me how the two different shops could just get burnt. Whoever did this targeted the owner of shop KH23up, who has a parking store at MF2A. But the person wrongly set Shop MF 1A ablaze.”

    Efforts to get Aba Fire Chief, Mr. Okezie Uche, were unsuccessful last night.

    But a source at the station, who claimed to be in the team that put out the fire, said the cause of the inferno could not be far from what he called a “wilful act”.

    He said: “We got to the market around 4 a.m and worked until about 7.30 a.m. But the problem we encountered was that our vehicle could not enter the market because of the type of construction work and building of shops in the market. Almost all the fire routes in the market had been blocked with one structure or the other.

    “The security men on duty could not even easily identify the location of the inferno. That also delayed the time of attending to the fire. But the good news is that we were able to save goods estimated at millions of naira from being consumed in the inferno.”

    Addressing reporters yesterday, the caretaker chairman of Eke-Oha Shopping Centre, Mr. Friday Dimiri said: “At 3 o’clock this morning, I got a distress call from the security men here about a fire in the market. I quickly called firefighters and got the police involved to avoid theft. I rushed down here with my team and we have been here doing the most we can to calm things down. The firemen, with most of us, who came earlier, and with the help of God Almighty, helped made sure the fire didn’t spread to other parts of the market.

    “The police have arrested the security men who serve here to know the reality of the incident. The goods damaged by the fire cannot be ascertained yet as proper estimate with the owners have not been done. We will cooperate with the police to get to the bottom of the incident.”

     

  • Fire at Osun governor’s office

    Office of the Osun State Governor, Mr. Rauf Aregbesola, on Monday was razed by fire.

    It was gathered that the fire outbreak linked to power surge started very late yesterday afternoon.

    The fire did not consume any equipment and items.

    Investigation further revealed that the fire started from sparks from one of the air conditioners in the office.

    Men of the state Fire Service raced to the scene to battle the fire and prevent it from escalating.

    Preferring anonymity, an eye witness, who works in the office complex, said nobody was trapped “because as soon as the fire started people were alerted and odered to vacate their offices.

    On the scene, security operatives were stationed around the premises when our correspondent visited the Governor’s Office around 6.45 pm.

    Speaking with reporters, the state Commissioner of Information, Mr. Lani Baderinwa, who confirmed  that the fire incident was as a result of power surge,  said: “No a single document or equipment was destroyed  and nobody was hurt. We reiterate that every document in the governor’s office is intact.

    “The fire mainly affected the Office of the Governor alone and no other office is affected. It is not a serious fire outbreak. It is regrettable that the electricity suppliers have been persistently unable to regulate the supply of power to meet the necessary standard. Many Nigerians have lost their properties to power surge and other electrical malfunctioning.”

    Also, the Commissioner of Police in the state, Mr. Olafimihan Adeoye, was at scene but declined to comment on it.

  • Fire razes six shops in Kano market

    No fewer than six shops were burnt at Kofar Wambai Jewellery Market (Kasuwar ‘Yan Yeri) in Kano on Friday night, the Director of the State Fire Service, Alhaji Sagir  Madaki, said yesterday.

    He told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Kano that his men received a distress call from Kofar Wambai Police Division at about 8:57p.m that there was fire outbreak at the market.

    “On receiving the information, we quickly sent some of our personnel and fire fighting vehicle to the scene of the incident at about 9:05p.m to quench the fire,” he said.

    Madaki said that with the quick intervention of fire service personnel it took 55 minutes to put it under control so as not to spread to other shops.

    The director said the cause of the fire was under investigation.

    He advised traders at the market and other residents to be more careful and desist from using instruments capable of triggering fire as a way of guarding against future occurrence.

    The director also advised the people to keep fire bucket, fire blanket and fire extinguisher that would enable them to curtail the spread of fire before calling on the fire service.

  • Fire guts NNPC Minna depot

    Fire yesterday gutted the Minna, Niger State depot of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) as some black marketers’ scooped fuel from a leaking tank.

    Eyewitnesses and NNPC officials said there were no casualties.

    A worker of the NNPC said the leakage started on Saturday but the fire began about 11am on yesterday when the black marketers mobilised themselves and started scooping the fuel.

    He said: “We have been on ground since yesterday when the leakage started but these miscreants caused the fire as they went to the drainage to start scooping fuel.”

    The fire scared travellers and motorists off the busy Minna-Paiko road, they were afraid of taking the route for fear of a repeat of the Lagos incident.

    A resident who lives close to the depot, Ibrahim Paiko, said the leakage flowed through the depot’s drainage of the depot and when the black marketers saw it, they mobilised themselves and started scooping.

    “Despite the presence of security men, the boys refused to stop and the fire started.”

    Director-General of the Niger State Emergency Agency (NSEMA) Ahmed Ibrahim Inga said they were able to control the situation early. “If not that we started evacuation on time, it would have been a big disaster. We thank God everything has returned to normalcy. Thank God we alerted the people quickly and we were able to arrest the situation. Evacuation measures have been put in place and thank God the situation is now calm.

    “There are no casualties and we are trying to quell the fire totally and then we will go round to access what the situation is.”