A devastating fire swept through a city refuelling station yesterday afternoon, burning at least eight vehicles including an octane-laden lorry and injuring two people

The flames that rose up to 200 feet in the sky created severe panic among the commuters and eventually caused huge traffic congestion in the area. Reports of traffic jam came from Mohakhali and airport road when the report was being filed at 9:30 last night.

Eleven units of firefighters fought for around one and a half hours in life risk and doused the flames, which could be seen from distant localities.

Refuelling station Amam Enterprise on Shaheed Tajuddin Ahmed Sarani near Mohakhali inter-district bus terminal caught fire around 5:00pm when the octane-laden lorry was unloading fuel to the underground reserved tank.

The cause of the fire could not be known immediately as the lorry driver fled the scene.

Eyewitness Zobayer Hossain, manager of the station, told The Daily Star, "When octane was being unloaded from the lorry, I suddenly saw a fire in the pipeline and within seconds it engulfed the lorry."

He said the lorry was loaded with 9,000 litres of octane, while there were 8,000 litres of diesel and around 3,000 litres of octane in the reserved tank.

Another witness Meer Akbar Hossain, owner of affected Akbar Motors-Workshops, said, "When the fire started someone drove the lorry away from the reserved tank Fuel was still spewing from the lorry which spread in the area as the vehicle moved. ”

"As the lorry was quickly driven away, the leaked fuel mainly fell on the road and flowed towards the slope," he added.

SEE PAGE 15 COL 6 FROM PAGE 1

"The burning fuel flowed through Satata Automobiles and Akbar Motors Workshop burning all the seven parked vehicles and other materials."

Fire Service Deputy Director Abdur Rashid suspects the fire might have been originated from burning cigarette end. He said, "If the lorry was not driven away from the reserved tank, a huge explosion might have occurred causing a severer catastrophe in the area."

The witnesses said the firefighters fought hard to douse the flames in high risk as the octane-laden lorry could have exploded anytime.

Fire service sources said they used fire-extinguishing foam so that the flames could notspread.

Four other refuelling stations and automobile centres in the area were shut down, while vehicular movement on the road from Mohakhali to Rainbow Crossing was halted completely.

As the road remained blocked, a severe traffic jam was created surrounding the roads till 7:00pm. Moreover, thousands of curious people thronged the area hindering the activities of the firefighters.

Several hundred personnel from Rab and police had to struggle hard to control the curious people.

Among the injured two, condition of Lokman, who was admitted to Dhaka Medical College Hospital, was stated tom be critical, while the another could not be traced.