The Fire Department would put a ‘Fire Unsafe Building' board in front of hospitals, which did not initiate fire safety measures, warned Ray Vinay Ranjan, Additional DGP and DG, Fire Services.
Addressing a meeting with Andhra Pradesh Super Specialty Hospitals Association (ASHA) on Saturday, he said during inspections, most of the hospitals of high rise were found to be utilising the cellars for generators and transformers, which was strictly prohibited.
He asked the hospital authorities to prepare an emergency plan along with roll allocation to the staff to be followed in cases of emergency and said the Fire Department was also ready to guide the architects on National Building Code (NBC).
M.T. Krishna Babu, GHMC Commissioner asked the ASHA members to use cellars only for parking purposes and within a week vacate canteens, OP blocks, dormitories and pathological labs that came up in cellars. After a week, the GHMC would start vacating the cellars, he added.
The Commissioner informed that of 91 bigger hospitals, the fire prevention wing inspected 23 and all of them were found to be using the cellar for other purposes.
He asked the hospitals to post a Fire Safety Officer to look after fire prevention arrangements and conduct mock drills once a month. The GHMC would organise one-day workshops for fire safety officers.
K. Dhanunjay Reddy, Additional Commissioner (Planning), P. Venkateshwar, Director, Fire Services, C. Lakshmi Prasad, Additional Director, Fire Prevention Wing, B. Bhasker Rao, ASHA president and others participated in the meeting.
