Madurai district collector MS Sangeetha, who rushed to the station to enquire, said 10 persons were killed in the fire accident in the train compartment. 20 people with injuries have been admitted to a hospital for treatment.
Madurai, Tamil Nadu:
At least 10 people have died and more than 20 are injured in a massive fire that broke out inside a stationary train compartment in Madurai railway station early this morning. The Southern Railway said that an “illegal gas cylinder” on board led to the fire. The passengers of the “private party coach” had arrived from Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh.
Madurai district collector MS Sangeetha, who rushed to the station to enquire, said 10 persons were killed in the fire accident in the train compartment. 20 people with injuries have been admitted to a hospital for treatment.
“10 persons reported dead,” in the fire, a Southern Railway release said.
“In addition to railway staff, police, fire, and rescue services personnel were also involved in dousing the fire. Furthermore, they skillfully extricated the charred bodies from the compartment.”
“The fire broke out at 5:15 am today. Subsequently, the fire service personnel, who arrived at the spot half an hour later, managed to put down the blaze by 7:15 am, as stated in a Southern Railway release.”
“This is a private party coach that was attached at Nagercoil Junction yesterday (Aug 25) by train no. 16730 (Punalur-Madurai Exp). They detached the party coach and placed it at the Madurai Stabling line. The passengers in the private party coach have…. smuggled gas cylinder and this has caused the fire,” the release said.
The party coach had started the journey from Lucknow on August 17, scheduled to return to Chennai on Sunday and return to Lucknow from there, it added.
“Some members of the party in the private party coach were using the illegally smuggled cooking gas cylinder unauthorizedly for preparing tea/snacks while the coach was stabled/parked. Which caused the fire in the stabled/parked coach. Most of the passengers could get out of the coach on noticing fire. Some passengers had already got down at platform also before detachment of coach,” it added.
“The authorities stated that they were paying an amount of ₹10 lakh to each family of those who died.”
Southern Railway also announced two help line numbers for information related to the fire incident and causalities– 9360552608, 8015681915.
Any individual can book party coach using IRCTC portal. “They must not carry any inflammable materials like gas cylinders.” The coach is to use only for transportation purpose, the release said, adding senior officials were rushing to the spot.
CREDIT: NDTV
