Fire at garment factory in Bhiwandi: Many rescued, flames doused

A massive fire broke out at a powerloom unit at Bhiwandi in Thane on Tuesday, reports said. According to reports, around 150 people were in the building when the fire broke out. Many people were feared trapped inside the multistory building. Several people were seen standing on the roof of the building in the TV visuals, while some were trying to come down using ladders. Five fire tenders reached the spot and efforts were on to douse the flames. Reports say the fire first broke out at the ground floor and took no time to spread to other floors.

The blaze occurred in a godown where powerloom-related material like oil and yarn were stored on the ground floor of three-storey Aam Manzil, a building in a residential locality of Nagaon in Bhiwandi, Bhiwandi-Nizampur Municipal Corporation’s disaster control section chief Namdeo Gaikwad said.

Bhiwandi tehsildar Vaishali Lambhate said that residents took shelter in the terrace of the building after the fire broke out. Fire tenders from Kalyan, Thane, and four fire stations of Bhiwandi were rushed to the spot and the blaze was brought under control, he said. About 15-20 people in the building were shifted to the top floor as a precautionary measure since cooling operations were underway on the ground floor, he said.

The fire broke out at around 7.30 AM in the godown and spread in other rooms on the ground floor, he said. The presence of oil drums at the place led to the fire spreading in other rooms, he said. Once the cooling operations are through, those trapped in the building would be brought down, Gaikwad said.

Short-circuit was suspected to be the cause of the blaze. However, the official said the exact cause of the fire was yet to be ascertained. Senior officials of the civic body, fire brigade and police department were at the spot.