On Thursday afternoon, an incident occurred in the operation theatre of a private hospital located in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh. According to police, no casualties were reported.
Local reporters were informed by an unidentified fire department official that they got a call at approximately noon regarding a fire incident at the Indus Hospital located in Jagadamba Centre.
“To put out the fire and rescue the trapped patients, we have rushed four fire tenders and rescue teams to the scene,” he stated. 52 patients, including 15 in the intensive care unit (ICU), were saved, he said, and taken to nearby hospitals.
Police and state disaster response force (SDRF) teams arrived at the scene, and preliminary investigations by the police revealed that the fire started in the hospital’s operation room on the second floor when nitrous oxide leaked and ignited an electrical line shortly after.
The fire quickly spread to the entire floor, and the first and third stories were enveloped in thick fume clouds. Referring to Visakhapatnam police commissioner Ravi Shankar Ayyannar, “all the patients in the two floors were brought to safety,” Ramana, a local journalist with a vernacular daily, reported.
Many of the out-patients and their companions were saved by hospital staff, police, and SDRF teams; however, some of them emerged on their own. “There were no casualties,” police said.
