A two-bedroom wooden house was completely destroyed by fire at Block 22 Squatting Area, Wismar, Linden, on Tuesday afternoon. The incident occurred sometime after 13:00h. According to neighbours, the house, which was unoccupied at the time, went up in flames after someone lit surrounding grass, and the fire eventually spread to the house. It was burned to the ground by the time firefighters attached to the Linden Fire Station responded. The firemen, however, managed to contain the blaze before it spread to nearby houses. When this publication visited the scene, the house was completely burnt and nearby grassland also appeared to be burnt. A neighbour, Robert (only name given), said the owners of the house would only visit occasionally.
The completely gutted house
“Is somebody went lighting fire, and the fire blaze all through…Couple people well used to live in this house but them people end up beating out…and left the place just so… I just used to see them coming one and two time to clean up the house…”, he explained.
The clearly upset man indicated that it was customary for persons with surrounding land to burn the vegetation as a means of clearing the land.
“Now the girl house burn down. Nobody don’t live here no more. Somebody was probably coming to live. I see they used to come and clean up… but all this happened because of people careless attitude”, he continued.
The Fire Department has since launched an investigation.
