Residents, avert fire disaster at a fuel station in Yenagoa

Residents, avert fire disaster at a fuel station in Yenagoa The intervention of residents who promptly responded before arrival of Fire service averted a fire disaster on Wednesday at a a petrol station at Akenfa, a suburb of Yenagoa, the Bayelsa capital. The inferno destroyed properties worth millions of naira at the station operated by Millomi and Sons Enterprises Nigeria Limited. It was gathered that the fire started from the generator house behind the building. No life was lost in the incident even as the filling station was not dispensing fuel when the accident occurred. Several policemen from Akenfa Division were seen drafted to the scene of the fire accident to maintain law and order. An eyewitness Mr Emmanuel Stanley said at the scene of the incident that some youths from the area mobilised to put out the raging fire after it started. He said that they used water mixed with detergent as well as sand to put out the fire before men of the Bayelsa State Fire Service arrived at the ill-fated petrol station. "When we came here, they told us that the fire started from the generator house. We tried to stop the fire when we came. “We used water, detergent and sand to quench it. Individually, we tried to call fire service before they came", Stanley said. The managing director of the filling station, Mr Godwin Tuma, said he was in his office in the filling station building when the fire broke out. Tuma said that he does not know what caused the fire. Counting the losses, he said two generators worth N7 million and a three thousand-litre diesel tank were destroyed by the fire. "I was in the office, so my television shut down. So, that's when I went to check what was happening. I don't really know what happened. “I saw smoke from the generator. The fire burnt two generators and three thousand-litre diesel tank. The cost of the generators is about N7million", he said. Tuma, who commended members of the public for rushing out to help the filling station, confirmed that no casualty was recorded in the fire incident.