6 dead, 141 injured in Mumbai hospital blaze

A massive fire swept through a government hospital in Mumbai on Monday evening killing six people and leaving 141 patients and visitors injured, officials said.

A total of 147 people, including patients and visitors, were rescued after the fire broke out at the ESIC Kamgar Hospital at Marol in suburban Andheri, said an official of the Disaster Management Cell of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation.

They were subsequently shifted to different hospitals, he said.

The official said 19 of them were taken to civic-run Cooper Hospital where two were declared brought dead.

Another 33 were shifted to Seven Hills Hospital in Andheri where three were declared dead, he said.

Forty were taken to Holy Spirit Hospital, Andheri (East), where one of them was declared brought dead, the official said.

Some of the injured were discharged, while the others were undergoing treatment in different hospitals with some of them in the intensive care unit, he said.

A fire brigade official said the blaze at the hospital was reported at 4.03 pm and it was extinguished at 7.35 pm.

“The building is a ground plus five-floor structure and the blaze erupted on the fourth floor,” the official said.

The deceased are yet to be identified, he said, adding the cause of the fire was not yet known.

Mumbai Mayor Vishwanath Mahadeshwar said it was under investigation.

“At present, our priority is to ensure patients sent to hospitals get proper treatment,” the mayor said.

Recalling the horror, a patient, Santosh Kadam, said, “I was on the fourth floor and was going to the ground floor to get my MRI done.          

“Suddenly, nurses and other staffers started shouting and told us to vacate the building since a fire had broken out. I along with my other relatives came down safely.”           

Another patient Girish Patel said, “I saw smoke emanating from the third and fourth floors. There was thick layer of smoke. People panicked and started running helter-skelter before hospital staff came and advised us to vacate the floor quietly.”

According to another civic official, over 160 patients were admitted in the hospital at the time of the blaze.

Milind Ogle, the deputy chief fire officer of the MIDC area, said, “Our team had found some lacunae in an under-construction building coming up adjacent to the hospital and suggested their rectification.”

“The hospital administration was in the process of complying with our suggestions. Meanwhile, this incident took place in the old hospital building,” Ogle said.

The 325-bed hospital was constructed in 1970s, the officials said, adding police and hospital authorities have vacated the building till further notice.

Fire brigade personnel had to break the glasses of the building’s facade to evacuate stranded patients, they said.

Additional Commissioner of Police Manoj Sharma said an inquiry will be launched in association with the fire brigade department to ascertain the cause of the fire.