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TENGRATILA BLOWOUT

Vast swath of land lays a wasteland

Rafiq Hasan, from Tengratila
The June 24 blowout from a Niko relief well at Tengratila in Sunamganj district has wreaked irreparable environmental and ecological havoc in at least two-kilometre radius.
The unabated flames shooting up to 200 feet for the last 10 days have burnt thousands of trees and hundreds of acres of crops to ashes. "We used to get hundreds of jackfruits, mangoes and papaya every year. But this year we have not got any," says Shahara Khatun, who lives in a mud house adjacent to the gas field.
The black smoke emitted from
the burning well has suffocated the fish, poultry, a large number of livestock and other small living organisms in the area, with many a people falling sick from the poisonous fumes.
The government medical team on the first day of examination found over 250 people in the area suffering from hearing problems, headache, skin diseases and fever because of the heat and heavy noise.
The non-stop blowout also carries and spreads hot sand and ashes on the vegetation, houses and fields.
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Since the explosion, villagers in the area have been spending sleepless nights as the tremor caused by the blast continued to shake the ground. Signs of damage are everywhere. Buildings and fields near the wellhead are cracked and some of the tin-roof houses tilted.
"No-one can sleep in the night within a radius of one kilometre, as the shaking of ground is felt more during the night," says Rabiul Alam of Tengratila village.
Rabiul, who lives roughly half a kilometre away from the burning well, claims at least 90,000 fishes in his fisheries died following the second Niko Resources disaster. Only five months ago, on January 7, a severe blowout almost destroyed the ill-fated gas field.
"I constructed a building spending 16 lakh taka just a few months ago. But the blast and relentless vibration have made large cracks at many places of the house," says Rabiul.
The impact of the blast is felt even at Sharifpur, a village two and a half kilometres away from the gas field in Doarabazar upazila, where water is bubbling. Bubbles of gas are also seen in the nearby Surma River.
Villagers say flocks of birds that used to rest here now no longer come this way. The repeated blowouts threaten the fishes with extinction, for whom this remote lowland dominated by haors (lakes) and marshes has been a safe haven forlong.
"Our life has become miserable due to the repeated blowouts," says Tengratila Union Parishad Member Abdur Rahman, adding, "we don't want to see any more firein the future."
According to Abdur Rahman, the gas exploration activities of Niko Resources (Bangladesh) Ltd have not brought any benefit for the locals. "Rather, we are always in panic of a fresh explosion and fire," he says, adding, "these accidents have forced our boys and girls to stop going to school for many days."
The day before yesterday, the height of the flame lessened a bit but its girth spread further to all the nearby wells. The well that exploded in January was also burning. A nearby pond was boiling.
Shahara Khatun says all the children of her family are suffering from various diseases like fever, headache and heat stroke. Her daughter Zarina Khatun, a student of Class Six, became so frightened seeing the furious fire that she has been trembling all the time.
Shahara shifted her family to a nearby village after the accident. Even there, Zarina had been feverish for many days.
No Niko official was available for comment on Saturday. However,
Ashraf, chief security official of Tengratila gas field, claims Niko is trying to arrest the fire, "But it's not easy to douse such a fierce fire. It would require digging another relief well beside the burning one."
Ashraf says company officials are going to hire rigs for drilling the relief well. However, he does not know how many days would be required to extinguish the blaze.
According to him, a total of 80 families living in the nearby areas were evacuated to other places after the blowout.
He also says a non-governmental organisation is assessing the environmental damage of the fire and the actual picture would be known after the study is complete.