Meera Ramamurthy, a city resident, was on her way to Bangalore by train on Wednesday evening, when her son-in-law called and told her that the building they lived in, on Turnbulls Road in Nandanam had caught fire and he was trapped in his house. Thick, dark smoke was rising from the ground floor, he told her.
Ms. Ramamurthy’s train had started moving, but she managed to get down and rushed to her house, located near Moopanar Flyover. The electricity meter box on the ground floor had caught fire at around 4.30 p.m., and had gutted a motorcycle.
“Luckily no one was injured,” said Ms. Ramamurthy. Akash, the son-in-law, said that earlier in the day, electricity supply at his home kept tripping. “All the six apartments in the building are occupied,” he said.
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The residents immediately alerted the fire station and fire fighters doused the flames on the meter box and the motorcycle after ensuring that all the residents were safely evacuated. Some of the residents claimed that had the fire been bigger, lives could have been lost as the building has no fire exit.
Officials suspect the meter box was very old and had malfunctioned.