20 tankers gutted in Nowshera oil depot fire
PESHAWAR: A massive blaze guted at least 20 oil tankers parked at the Tarujaba oil depot in Nowshera district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on Saturday evening.
Police and Rescue 1122 officials said the blaze started at around 3:00pm and was brought under control late at night.
Both the police and Rescue 1122 did not say how the blaze started. A video clip of the incident posted online showed several oil tankers parked in the yard with some of them engulfed by flames.
Another video showed huge flames and smoke plumes rising from the depot as some people ran away from the spot.
A Rescue 1122 official said that at least 20 firefighting vehicles took part in a taxing effort to put out the flames.
The firefighting vehicles from Charsadda, Mardan and Peshawar districts were also called in for extinguishing the fire.
A police official told Dawn that one person was injured in the blaze. He said the place which normally houses drivers and transporters was almost empty at the time of the incident as most of the drivers had gone to their homes for Eid Al Fitr. He also expressed ignorance about the extent of damage caused by the fire.
A Rescue 1122 statement issued earlier said that there were about 150 tankers parked in the yard and about 20 were guted in the blaze.
In a separate development, ater the Met Office’s forecast for dust-thunderstorm and rainfall during Eid holidays an alert has been issued to Lahore, Multan and Islamabad airport administrations.
The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and the Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) has also dispatched circulars to all airlines.
Dust storm and light rainfall may occur in Lahore and outskirts, according to the circular. “All airlines should complete advance arrangements in view of the weather alert,” according to the circular.
The Met Office has predicted a dust storm in Karachi and adjoining districts of Sindh on 2nd May.
A westerly wave is likely to enter Balochistan from Monday. This weather system will bring dust-thunderstorm and rain in Sukkur, Larkana, Dadu, Jacobabad Shikarpur and KambarShahdadkot districts.
PMD has also forecast duststorm in Karachi, Hyderabad, Thata, Badin, Mirpurkhas, Shaheed Benazirabad and Umerkot districts on Monday.