in wake of devastating Mahdia fire

By Shamar Meusa

THE Presential Commission of Inquiry (CoI) into the devastating fire at the Mahdia dormitory that claimed the lives of some 20 children continued on Friday, with four witnesses providing testimony, including the Head of Surgery at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation, Dr. Shilindra Rajkumar.

Dr. Rajkumar was among medical personnel who were flown in to Region Eight (Potaro-Siparuni), where the tragedy occurred, in the wee hours of the morning following news of the fire to tend to the victims.

Testifying under oath, Dr. Rajkumar referred to the event as the most tragic he has ever had to render assistance to in his 20 years of practice.

Filling his audience in on the gory details, Dr. Rajkumar recalled that when he and a team from the GPHC arrived at Mahdia just after 03:00hrs on the day in question, the airstrip was a hive of activity, with cars every which way.

He said that despite the fact that the scene with which they were greeted was chaotic, he and his team were subsequently able to acquire a vehicle and make their way to the Mahdia Hospital.

Upon arrival there, Dr. Rajkumar said, the first thing he did was to enquire about the most critical patients, whereupon he was told that they were already at the airstrip. This bit of information caused him to ask to be taken back to the airstrip to conduct an assessment of those patients before declaring it safe to medically evacuate them to Georgetown.

Asked about the state of those victims that were still at the Mahdia Hospital, Dr. Rajkumar revealed that he did an assessment of them before heading back to the airstrip a second time, at which point he and his teammates were told that the first aircraft with three patients had already left.

Subsequently, three other patients who were slated to be medevacked were assessed, and it was then that Dr. Rajkumar determined that they were not at the stage or level to be medevacked, as compared to the other students that had been observed at the hospital.

During his testimony, he provided details on the levels of injuries that he had seen while assessing some patients.

Meanwhile, upon his return to the Mahdia Hospital, he said that the team at the hospital which consisted of nurses and doctors, some of whom were off duty at the time, were overwhelmed, but, given the circumstances, the team did well in managing the situation.

Also providing testimony to the CoI was Javid Mohamed, the second-in-charge of the fire prevention department at the Guyana Fire Service, who gave his account of the fire investigations that took place on the ground.

Mohamed revealed that he, along with his team, were able to make it Mahdia at around 6:10 am after the first attempt to land at Mahdia hours earlier proved futile because of the weather.

However, upon conducting the investigation after arriving on scene, they were able to determine that the fire began at the northeastern door of the facility, which was close to a washroom area. That initial investigation further proved that there was no chance the fire could have been started by electrical means, as there were no electrical outlets there.

Investigators also learned that at the time of the fire, the majority of the students were asleep and were awakened by calls of fire some students ran to the room where the dorm’s mother was at the time while others attempted to escape however all doors in the facility were locked.

Mohamed added a student was interviewed and mentioned that a few hours before the fire was started there was an issue with another student who had a cellphone which was against the dorm’s policy. In this case, it was noted that the deputy head of the school was summoned to intervene and took the cell phone away from the student.

Meanwhile, he noted that what led to the conclusion that the fire was one that was maliciously set was the officer’s observation of the “V-pattern” of the fire, among other things.

They further noted that the dorm was not equipped with a fire alarm, smoke detectors, or fire detection system.

Two other witnesses gave testimony on Friday; however, an announcement will be made by the commission in relation to the next hearing day.

On May 21, the country was plunged into a state of mourning as a deadly fire ripped through the girls’ dormitory of the Mahdia Secondary School, claiming the lives of twenty children who hailed from various Amerindian communities.

The response saw a convergence of medical personnel, government officials, members of the joint services, and aviation personnel working assiduously to provide assistance.