THREE Brazilian nationals who reside at 41b Oronoque and Lamaha streets are homeless after a fire destroyed the upper flat of their home. The fire reportedly started at 04:58hrs on the veranda of the home.

The distraught family who was unable to save any of their belongings from the building before it was completely engulfed in flames, declined to speak to members of the media.
Divisional Officer with responsibility for operations, Gregory Wickham, said that the Guyana Fire Service responded to the blaze with four tenders. Although the building was engulfed firefighters were able to contain the fire into one building and were able to prevent it from spreading to any of the neighbouring buildings. However the building was severely damaged internally.

Further, he related that no one was injured during the fire. “No injury sustained by anyone. Initially, the firefighters, on arriving, were informed that the fire was in the veranda area, and so that’s where we are picking up the lead from the investigators. They are on scene and currently they are carrying out investigative work. The result of that will be made manifest to the public by the chief fire officer,” the officer related.

A neighbor, George Russo, said he used three fire extinguishers in an attempt to put out the inferno, but to no avail. “I was alerted that there was a fire next door and I ran across and alerted a Brazilian. She was downstairs when she realised that there was a fire. She really did not know what to do,” Russo said.

The man added that he entered the building with a fire extinguisher and made several attempts to put out the fire but the blaze became too much for him to handle. “I ran back home collected another fire extinguisher ran inside got pass the dogs and started with the fire, first extinguisher finish fire contained a bit, ran back out came back for more extinguishers get back in the home by that time the fire was a little bit more blazing, second extinguisher finished and the third reached about half and the fire started to spread all over my head,” Russo recounted.