While the fire is estimated to have occurred between 2.30 am and 2.35 am, a call was made to the fire brigade only at 3.13 am, probe has revealed
By the time the fire brigade reached the ICU, it had been completely charred and filled with smoke. Pic/Hanif Patel
Investigations into the fire at Virar’s Vijay Vallabh Hospital have revealed that while the fire took place around 2.30 am, the call to the fire brigade was made only at 3.15 am. The fire killed 15 patients on Friday last week. A fire official said lives could have been saved had a call been made earlier.
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While the exact time is yet to be ascertained, it occurred between 2.30 am and 2.35 am. “But the fire brigade was called at 3.13 am,” said a source at the Crime Branch. “The number used to call the fire brigade does not belong to hospital staff,” the source added.
“It seems three to four patients tried to run away from the ICU when the fire started but they could not manage to escape and were burned alive,” said a police officer.
“Plastic oxygen masks were found melted on the patients’ face and neck. The bodies and ICU beds were covered in black soot. Some were too deformed due to the excessive thermal injury,” a source explained. “The caller said the fire broke out inside the ICU at Vijay Vallabh Hospital. When we asked his name, he said Prashant and disconnected the call,” said leading fireman Kiran Arekar.
The person whose mobile was used to make the call said, “I was at the hospital when a man requested to use my phone as his had no network. I didn’t know him.” “When we entered the ICU, there was only smoke, nothing was visible. So we broke one of the glass windows. We doused the flames but everything had burnt. It seems we were informed a little late. Precious lives could have been saved,” said Vishal Shirke, fire station in charge at Virar. Sources told mid-day that a nurse saw a spark near one of the three cassette air conditioning units in the ICU. Just as she opened the door, the unit exploded.
The proprietor of RAV Fire Services Rajnish Kumar told mid-day that the hospital had not taken fire-fighting training. “We had given fire fighting training to Vijay Vallabh hospital’s staff in 2019 but most of them quit during the pandemic. I had been reminding the officials to conduct fire-fighting lessons for staff but the hospital did not reciprocate,” Kumar said. “We also sent reminders to refill fire extinguishers but the hospital was careless,” he added.
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