Area sealed, tests on for presence of chemicals after Ludhiana gas leak: NDRF
The NDRF said its personnel were testing the level of radiation, if any, and presence of chemicals in the area
New Delhi: Close your windows and stay inside. Do not let the air outside enter your houses. These were the instructions repeatedly announced on loudspeakers by the teams of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) during a rescue operation in the aftermath of a gas leakage that killed at least 11 people in Punjab’s Ludhiana on Sunday morning.
Wearing self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) sets, two teams of the NDRF’s 13th battalion knocked on the doors of houses and shops within a 500sqm area in Ludhiana’s Giaspura area to check for residents, who may have been trapped due to effects of poisonous gas. The SCBA set, officials said, seals the air within the suit and does not let gas from outside to permeate the suit.
“Inside one house, we found five children hiding in one corner. They were safe because they had stayed inside. They were in a state of shock. We rescued them quickly and got them to a nearby hospital,” said Uttam Chand, commandant of the NDRF’s 13th battalion. “In another house, we found a man and a woman, who was unconscious.”
During the day, photographs of NDRF personnel wearing SCBA sets and carrying handheld electronic dosimeters were widely circulated on social media.
The NDRF said its personnel were testing the level of radiation, if any, and presence of chemicals in the area. Till late Sunday night, the area was still sealed even as officials confirmed the level of poisonous gas had decreased.
In the afternoon, another team from the NDRF’s 7th battalion joined the operation. Santosh Kumar, commandant of the battalion, said the sensors had detected a high level of Hydrogen sulfide in the air.
Suspecting that the gas had escaped from multiple manholes of the sewage unit passing through the area, the NDRF, police and local administration held a meeting after the initial rescue operation. “During the joint meeting, we decided to use caustic soda and water in the sewage through the manhole to negate the hydrogen sulfide. The civic administration arranged the soda while the fire department provided water. It was then mixed and passed through the sewage line,” said Kumar. “The situation is under control but we are still monitoring the area.”
The rescuers said that none of the injured had burn marks or any other injuries. The people who died may have fallen unconscious and died on the spot within minutes, they added. Officials on the ground said the area has industrial units nearby and also some local factories, including dairies.
“The experts from Punjab Pollution Control Board have taken the samples from the manholes. The area is still sealed. They will test if the waste from local industrial units led to this gas leakage,” one official aware of the ground operations said, requesting anonymity.
