There seems to be no let-up in accidents at various industries in Visakhapatnam and its neighbourhood with fire safety mechanism going for a toss.
Despite being the largest industrial hub of Sunrise Andhra Pradesh, social audit has remained on paper in the region. The increase in fatal accidents has been attributed to shortage of manpower at the disposal of fire safety, factories and other agencies as well as the AP Pollution Control Board.
The vapour cloud explosion due to leakage of gas at HPCL Visakh Refinery in 1997 is still fresh in memory. The incident claimed over 60 lives. Despite promise of fool-proof measures, the same unit saw cooling tower fire on August 27, 2013 killing 23 — an engineer and 22 contract workers. Oxygen pressure reduction station explosion at Visakhapatnam Steel Plant on June 13, 2012 claimed 19 lives.
A huge fire broke out at Biomax Fuels Ltd at Visakhapatnam Special Economic Zone-Duvvada necessitating air-dropping of 30,000 tonnes of foam. Major accidents also led to shifting of critically ill victims in air ambulance to Mumbai.
Pharma units of Hetero, Divi’s and many of the units located at Jawaharlal Nehru Pharma City-Parawada are regularly in news for fire accidents. In fact, the Director-General of Fire Safety, at a review meeting here a few years ago, regretted that majority of the industrial units in the region had not obtained ‘no-objection certificates.’
False promises
Social activist and former IAS officer E.A.S. Sarma said after every accident in which workers lost their lives or grievously injured, the State government would promise that a “safety manual” would be prepared and implemented.
“So far no such manual is in sight. There is a full-fledged industrial safety wing of the State government, but none of the senior officers in that department has been held accountable for the lapses. Nor has any promoter of the accident-prone industrial unit prosecuted,” he stated.
Coming to fire safety, the number of fire tenders in Visakhapatnam falls woefully short of the norms.
Fire safety consultant G.B. Venkatasivasubramaniam said despite enactment of several legislation on fire safety, the implementation was not up to the mark. He said going by the track-record of industries in the region, most of the accidents could be prevented by undertaking periodical check-up.
