Fires burn fibreboard factory at Gazaria, slum in Dhaka

News Desk :: A massive fire destroyed a fibreboard factory in Gazaria upazila of Munshiganj on Sunday, while another fire gutted shanties in the capital’s Banani area.

The New Age correspondent from Munshiganj reported that seven people, including a member of Bangladesh Ansar, were injured while trying to extinguish the blazing fire that broke out in a factory of Superboard Bangladesh at Hosendi in Gazaria on Sunday.

The fire originated in a warehouse of the factory, owned by the TK Group, at about 1:00 pm.

The injured, including six factory workers, were admitted to the Gazaria Upazila Health Complex.

Mohammad Saleh Uddin, deputy director at the Fire Service and Civil Defence Dhaka zone office, said that 12 firefighting units, including a firefighting robot, were engaged at the spot.

He told New Age at about 7:30pm that the fire was brought under complete control.

Rifat Mallik, in-charge of Gazaria Fire Service, said that presence of flammable materials inside the warehouse posed difficulty in dousing the fire.

The cause of the fire could not be known immediately, he added.

Gazaria upazila nirbahi officer Kohinur Aktar said that no deaths were reported, but she heard about several people being injured.

Meanwhile, the fire service department said that another fire broke out at Godown slum in the capital’s Banani at about 4:00pm on Sunday.

Fire service spokesperson Talha Bin Zasim said that ten fire stations jointly worked to douse the fire brought under control at about 5:30pm and the complete dousing required two more hours.

Describing the origin of the fire, a slum resident, Taslima Begum, said that the fire started in a shanty right next to hers. Initially she thought the smoke and smell from the fire were coming from a stove, but later she realised that it was spreading.

Mohammad Walid Khan, a driver from Pirojpur said that he lost all his belongings in the fire.

All his savings—Tk 30,000 stored in clay banks and tin boxes—and important documents all were burnt to ashes, he wailed.

As many as 102 people were killed and 281 others sustained burn injuries in 27,624 fire incidents across the country in 2023, according to fire service headquarters.

Of the total fire incidents, 9,813 incidents (35.52 per cent) happened due to short circuit, 4,906 (17.76 per cent ) from burning cigarettes, 4,117 (15.11 per cent ) from stoves, 923 (3.34 per cent) from playing with fire, 770 (2.79 per cent) from gas pipeline leakage, 124 (0.45 per cent ) from explosion of gas cylinders and boilers and 87 fire incidents occurred due to firecrackers explosion, the statistics said.