Five persons were rendered homeless after a fire completely destroyed their Port Mourant, Corentyne, Berbice home on Thursday. The fire reportedly started in the upper flat of the house, and quickly spread through the building, giving the occupants no time to salvage any household item.
The aftermath of the fire
Although the fire tenders arrived at the scene moments after they were summoned, their work was hampered by mechanical issues which saw the pump refusing to start.
Public-spirited citizens, however, formed a
One of the occupants of the house, Thagepattie Jhagru
bucket brigade and were able to save two nearby houses from going up in flames.
An occupant of the destroyed house, Thagepattie Jhagru, explained that she was in the lower flat of the building when she was informed that the house was on fire. As she checked, she saw flames coming through one of the windows from the upper flat of their Lot 279 Ankerville, Port Mourant home.
The house on fire on Thursday
At the time, she says, no one was in the upper flat, but her three children were in the lower flat.
“I wish I know what caused the fire. My husband was in the hammock and I was in the kitchen, and he tell me, ‘Look! Fire…’ I run upstairs to look for the children,” she explained.
She said that by the time she got to the upper flat it was engulfed, hence she could not say in what part of the house the fire started.
“There are no points upstairs because it is solar we are using. Is only the on-and-off light switch upstairs,” she explained.
However, in responding to the fire call, one unit from the Rose Hall Town Fire Department arrived on the scene, but the firefighters could not get the pump to pull water from the canal in front of the burning building.
A lorry with field workers attached to the Albion Sugar Estate was at the time passing, and stopped to render assistance by collecting buckets which they used to form a bucket brigade to save two nearby buildings.
By this time a unit from the New Amsterdam Fire Department, some 18 miles away, arrived and started to douse the building with water.
Divisional Fire Officer Haimchandra Persaud admitted that there were some challenges at the scene.
“The Rose Hall Fire Department, which is in close proximity, responded. There were some challenges which developed, and support came from New Amsterdam Fire Station. The top floor would have been engulfed in flames when the first arriving unit got here. We had some other support that would have come subsequently; that is, the Albion Fire Unit and a unit from New Amsterdam.”
The Senior Fire Officer was high in his praise for the efforts of residents and other public-spirited persons who rendered assistance during the period of firefighting.
“Definitely, there were some things that were challenging to us, especially the terrain. We had difficulty getting the truck to take water from the trench, but we would have overcome those hurdles and I am happy to say that the two neighbouring buildings were saved and it (fire) was confined to the building of origin,” he added.
An investigation into the cause of the fire has been launched.
