VADODARA, April 14: More than a hundred Fire Brigade personnel from the Vadodara Municipal Corporation along with Fire Academy trainees demonstrated a mock fire fighting operation at the Polo Ground here on National Fire Service Day on Wednesday.Clad in uniforms and equipped with safety measures, the fire personnel simulated a rescue using hook ladder belt, chair knot and a snorkel ladder imported from Italy. The mock resue was effected from the sixth floor of a 103 feet tall building opposite Polo Ground.
A goods laden truck was shown to have skidded off the roadside with driver stuck inside and a crew member buried under the truck. The fire brigade rescue team pushed pneumatic lifting bags under the truck which raised it one foot above the ground, and removed the man from under it. As the window of the driver's cabin was shown locked from inside, the firemen cut the iron window with pneumatic cutters and quickly shifted the `injured' to hospital. They then used a hydraulic winch to put the truck back on its wheels within moments. This was followed by a demonstration showing how to douse different types of fire with water, carbon dioxide and foam.
Firemen and the audience obseved two minutes silence in homage to 66 fire personnel who were killed in a fire accident in Victoria Dockyard, Mumbai, on April 14, 1946.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.