M’luru: Pachanady fire refuses to die down; Heavy smoke seen billowing from dump yard site

Mangaluru: The smoldering fire that began on Friday afternoon at the Pachanady dump yard continues to burn through the landfill. Firefighters are continuing their efforts on Saturday to contain the blaze.

MCC Commissioner Akshy Shridhar confirmed that the firefighting is still going on. “The operations continued till 2 am last night and have again resumed from around 6.30 am,” he said.

Thick plumes of smoke were visible from afar in the morning on Saturday as the blaze raged on. Some parts of the dump yard were not accessible on Friday mainly arising out of poor visibility from smoke and heavy winds in one direction, Shridhar said and added that all areas are being attended actively now.

Equipment from various industries in and around Mangaluru has been deployed to aid the firefighting efforts. “Along with earthmovers from MCC, fire tenders from the state fire department, from various industries and organizations like MSEZ, KIOCL, NMPT, HPCL, MCF, and Adani airport have been working tirelessly on this,” the commissioner said.

Changing winds and the size of the landfill seem to be hampering the firefighting operations. “Wind direction shifted early in the morning… and the smoke is majorly from the center of the landfill where it is inaccessible for the fire tenders to reach,” Shridhar said, adding that earth movers are being used to move closer to the center of the landfill, “but to get closer to the smoke is also difficult since it’s very heavy at the origin.”