– says Fire Chief

THE Guyana Fire Service (GFS) is alarmed by the number of local businesses that have been compromising their safety for profits even as he urged stronger fire safety measures at their commercial properties.

Fire Chief Marlon Gentle sat down on the Guyana Chronicle’s Vantage Point on Monday when he explained that many businesses rely heavily on padlocks, shutters and grills to protect their property but often time leave no avenue for escape in the case of a fire.
In the initial stage of a building being constructed, the plans for such are sent to the GFS from the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA).

The GFS then advises on fire safety measures such as fire detection systems, passive fire suppression systems, exists construction and placement, fire extinguishers, smoke alarms and sprinklers. However, even with all this available, many businesses are still being set up void of the basic necessities to cater for a fire. “We’re still not getting that full support or that support by compliance,” Gentle said.

“As businessman, while security may be one of the biggest things in your focus — you construct your business bearing in mind that you secure your building and what you have in there to sell — you have to also be cognizant that, at the same time, a fire can also occur in there and you could become trapped.”

Regarding putting business over safety, Gentle said that it is common in Guyana for residential buildings to be enclosed and sub-sectioned into various businesses where acts such as illegal electricity sharing and bartering are conducted.

Speaking on the recent fire at Vreed-en-Hoop where two Chinese nationals lost their lives, Gentle said that a number of businesses which occupied the small space was a contributing factor to the magnitude of the fire. “Initially, that building was wired for a basic living accommodation and now you have in it a business environment where you have a supermarket with freezers, displays and lighting and everything else in there and you compound that now by putting grills, and then on the outside of the grills and metal shutters,” Gentle said.

Investigation showed that the Vreed-en-Hoop fire originated in the supermarket from a walk-in freezer with a faulty power supply. The Fire Chief also noted that for some time the GFS was unaware that the two individuals were living in the commercial building.

Had they known, the Fire Service would have conducted a rescue prior to putting out a fire if there is reason to believe that someone may be trapped in the building.

“The persons became trapped because they were living in a section of the supermarket; they’ve shuttered it with both grills and metal shutters and they became trapped because these shutters are padlocked and locked from the outside, nobody could get to them,” he said. “Even then, there was no one to say that there is someone living in there and the person was trapped because the firefighting strategy’s size up would have said that we’re dealing with a business structure so the issue of lives and persons trapped would not be that great…it was somewhere late down in the firefighting operation that information started to surface that there were possibly two to three persons living in some area that they would have created in that supermarket.”

The Fire Chief stressed that buildings must always have an easy escape route in the event of a fire. Referencing another fire which took place in the popular business area of Regent and Camp Street, Gentle said that it was the banning of persons inside the building on the shutters padlocked outside that brought to the GFS’ attention that persons were trapped in the building.

He mentioned incidents in Berbice whereby a funeral parlour owner was trapped in his own building as well. “It’s a personal decision by persons to put their security as the highest aspect of their safety requirement whereby they put grills and all these things. While this may be so, it is necessary to have an escape route. You have to because fire is always a risk,” the Fire Chief said.

He also took the opportunity to caution against the use of uncertified electricians for electrical upgrades at homes and businesses. In celebration of Fire Prevention Week, the GFS will collaborate with its stakeholders to conduct fire inspections at some government buildings and private businesses. They will also use the week to ramp up sensitization to all Guyanese on the importance of placing greater seriousness on fire prevention and escape measures.