So many lives lost in fire from gas, but who will take responsibility?

The death toll from alarming incidents of kitchen stove gas fires is climbing rapidly

A patient at Dhaka Medical College Hospital’s burn unit.

Despite hundreds of injuries and dozens of deaths in recent fires from gas for kitchen stoves, there is no visible effort to prevent such disasters by identifying the reasons behind them.

In most cases, it is assumed that the blast-like fires are caused by gas from cylinders but victims, as well as doctors at the Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery, say many of the accident sites have pipeline connections.

Those marketing Liquified Petroleum Gas or LPG in cylinders claimed that the users should be aware, but at the same time, they pointed the finger at negligence in supply and illegal gas refill factories.

They say that cylinders are safe but they cannot ensure the quality of hosepipes, regulators, clumps and other equipment attached to the cylinders. They, however, had no answer when asked who was responsible for controlling the quality of these accessories.

After every gas fire incident, the Fire Service and Civil Defence submit a detailed report about the accident site. When the incident is severe, the Department of Explosives, another government body, runs an investigation as well. As of now, most of the investigations led to blaming the users rather than finding specific individuals or organisations responsible for the incidents.

Chief Explosive Inspector Mohammad Faruk Hossain said awareness among people was needed as most of the fire incidents were caused by gas leakage. They were issuing statements and advertisements to aware people, he said.

Azam J Chowdhury, president of the LPG Operators Association of Bangladesh, said they would start awareness-building programmes targeting dealers to users.

In reality, such incidents are not ceasing to occur. A physician at the national burn institute said they were receiving more burn patients than ever before.

At least 20 patients who died in the institute in the past one month were victims of gas fire, including two devastating incidents in Gazipur and Dhamrai.

Gas-related fire incidents cause deaths and injuries quite frequently. Some of the victims survive but they still suffer after returning from the hospital following medical treatment.

As Bangladesh’s socio-economic condition has changed rapidly, most of the urban population live in small apartments and are compelled to use gas stoves instead of earthen stoves that use wood as fuel.

Not all of the urban houses have gas pipelines so the demand for gas cylinders has increased. The users, however, feel anxious due to the uptick in the number of gas fire incidents.

At least 20 percent of the total population in the country of 20 million people use LPG while 25 percent use the gas supplied through pipelines, as per the Department of Explosives. Others use different types of stoves.

INCREASE IN ACCIDENTS

There has been an uptick in the number of victims of gas fire incidents with most of them belonging to the middle and lower-middle income families who live in congested flats, said Tariqul Islam, resident physician at the burn institute.

He noted that such fire incidents happened more on the outskirts of Dhaka than in the capital.

All four members of a family were burnt in a fire caused by gas in a flat in Dhamrai on Mar 26.

The father, mother and son have died while the daughter is still fighting for her life.

Authorities found a gas cylinder along with a pipeline connection inside the flat, but could not confirm from where the gas that accumulated in the house came.

The fire engulfed the flat when someone lit a stove just before Sahri, said Sohel Rana, chief of Dhamrai Fire Station.

In such cases, gas leaked from the cylinder accumulates inside the house and explodes into a big fire even with a little spark such as matchbox or cigarette lighters.

Mostly, the fire contains very high temperatures but does not remain for long. In many cases, the furniture in the house does not get damaged that much but human bodies cannot stand uch high temperatures.

At least 36 people were burnt in a fire caused by gas from a cylinder on a street of Gazipur on Mar 13. As many as 17 of them died one by one.

Witnesses said a man left the cylinder on the street after it started emitting gas.

When a woman in a nearby house ignited a stove, the gas accumulated on the street suddenly became a fireball.

There was no sign of fire on the street while the cylinder looked normal, but curious people who gathered to see the cylinder emitting gas with a hissing sound were burnt.

AFM Nasim, chief of Kaliakoir Police Station, said they seized the cylinder and found the regulator key broken.

The gas was leaking from that broken part, he said. ”The Fire Service taught us during training that in such cases, one can press the broken part with a finger and stop the gas leak.”

As many as 27,624 fire incidents took place across the country last year, according to the Fire Service and Civil Defence.

At least 770 cases of them, or around 2.8 percent, were caused by gas pipe leaks.

Another 125 fire incidents were caused by gas cylinders and boiler explosions, the Fire Service said.

“Gas fires are indeed smaller in extent but they cause more damage and casualties. Death toll rises in such fires as people get their face and respiratory tract burnt,” said Fire Service spokesman Shahjahan Mia.

WHAT VICTIMS SAY

Burn patients from across the country seek treatment at the Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery. The number of fire incidents went up due to the use of gas in households, said Md Tariqul Islam, resident physician of the institute.

“Patients told us that they smelled gas for quite a few days and had informed the house owners. But no one took any measure. Mostly the houses having gas pipeline connections face such incidents,” he said.

“Another incident happens with those using gas cylinders. They didn’t realise anything [suspicious] and when they light a matchstick to light the stove, fire breaks into the entire room. It could be their carelessness that led to the accumulation of gas causing the fire.”

They do not get burn patients from the upper class or the poor, he said. “Also, gas fire incidents don’t occur in the main city or metropolitan areas. Patients come mostly from the outskirts of Dhaka like Savar, Dhamrai, Ashulia, Munshiganj, and Narayanganj.

WORRIED PEOPLE

As gas fire incidents have become frequent, people are getting worried.

Many of them are keeping all the cylinders of multi-storey houses on the ground floors to avoid gas fires in small flats.

Zerin Sarwar, a resident of Mohammadpur’s Bosila, said she has been using gas cylinders for the last two years.

As she has seen many accidents happening around, she convinced her house owner to arrange to keep the cylinders on the ground floor.

Mitali Roy, a nurse at a private hospital, said they had to depend on their domestic help for household chores as she and her husband both work outside.

With the rise in gas-related accidents, Mitali directed her helper repeatedly to switch off the stove and then to turn off the regulator key of the cylinder.

She checks the stove and regulator every night before sleeping.

WHO WILL TAKE RESPONSIBILITY?

In any case of an accident, someone has to take responsibility, said Ferdous Ahmed, general secretary of Environment and Climate Movement, an NGO.

If it is a road accident, the responsible driver or others get named in cases and face punishment, he said.

“But so many gas fire incidents are occurring leading to the death of so many people, no one is there to take the responsibility. This can’t go on.”

“Till date, we never heard of anyone being held responsible in such cases. This can’t go on and the state has to take the responsibility. It must run a detailed investigation and identify the people or organisations behind it. Only then we can prevent such fire incidents.”

“A big industry of gas cylinders has developed in the country with millions of consumers. Will they make a profit only? Won’t they have any accountability to the consumers? We don’t see any awareness-building activity about the use of gas cylinders. They can’t evade this responsibility.”

NEGLIGENCE

Gas cylinders are not transported properly and there is also a lack of safety in storing them, said Azam J Chowdhury, president of the LPG Operators Association of Bangladesh.

”You’ll see how they [dealers] just toss the cylinders from trucks. This shouldn’t be done,” said Azam, the director of Omera Petroleum.

“The cylinders move from the operators to distributors, then to the customers through the dealers. We must ensure safety at all levels.”

He claimed the cylinders were very safe. “The valve at the top of a cylinder is checked three times before it leaves the factory. We’re also exporting the cylinders. The cylinders leave our factory only after their safety is ensured.”

When asked if they ran any investigation after an accident was reported, Azam said they did.

“This is a question of our company’s image and no one will buy our cylinders otherwise. In most

of the cases, we find the cylinders intact but fire erupted following an explosion.”

ILLEGAL REFILL FACTORY

Azam also pointed the finger at illegal cylinder refill factories existing on the outskirts of Dhaka.

In some cases, people were injured while filling gas into the small cylinders from the big ones.

“This has become a national problem,” Azam said about the factories. “There are hundreds of factories running the business of filling small cylinders with gas from small ones. This is an illegal and risky trade which we couldn’t stop,” he said.

There are other types of trade ongoing with the cylinders. The steel in the cylinders becomes pricier when sold as scrapped iron.

“The distributor finds it profitable to sell the cylinder to scrap metal traders for Tk 2,000 instead of the company for Tk 500.”

“The cylinders are scrapped there but it needs to be degasified before scrapping. Sometimes

accidents occur when the cylinders are scrapped without degasification.”

DEPARTMENT OF EXPLOSIVES

The Department of Explosives approves gas cylinder import and marketing in the country.

Faruk Hossain, chief explosive inspector of the department, said there was no scope of leakage from a cylinder’s body.

“A leak can happen when the ‘O ring’ inside the valve gets damaged or the hose pipe is torn. When the regulator key isn’t turned off properly, gas may leak. Sometimes, gas leaks out of the stove as well,” he said.

The department has been publishing advertisements in different media to create awareness among people to prevent gas leakage, he said.

“We wrote to the operators and distributors to inform us about the conditions of the cylinders they have. We’ll take action accordingly.”

[Writing in English by Sabrina Karim Murshed; editing by Osham-ul-Sufian Talukder]