MANDEVILLE, Manchester;
SOME THIRTY persons are now out of jobs and millions of dollars went up in smoke as yet another factory was razed due to the inadequate supply of water in Mandeville.
YZ Industries, a manufacturing company, is the latest in an ongoing list of business places to be gutted by fire in the parish capital.
According to reports, at about 3 p.m. on Saturday, smoke was seen coming from the building at Kingsland near the centre of the town. On further investigation, residents saw a huge fire engulfing the building and quickly alerted the Mandeville Fire Station.
LACK OF WATER
However despite their quick response, the limited water at their disposal was not enough to contain the fire which had spread rapidly throughout the building.
The loss of the factory and its contents has angered Deputy Mayor of Mandeville Sally Porteous. She said the building could have been saved if adequate water was made available to the fire personnel on the scene. "All this happens because the Government continue to treat the people as if they must wait their pleasure to remedy a situation that is so easy to solve".
She said she had received a call from the Fire Department at 4.15 p.m., saying they had been trying to get a Rapid Response unit for a fire for approximately 40 minutes but was told that a driver was not available.
Ms. Porteous said she had been trying for 10 months now to get one of the Rapid Response trucks to be parked at the fire department overnight and on weekends, "so that it can pull out right behind the fire engine when a call comes in."
EXCUSES
"They have been giving all kind of excuses," she said. "The latest limp excuse is that the drivers from the Fire Department cannot drive a water truck and that they would have to be trained", she said.
The Deputy Mayor also questioned the length of time it would take for persons to be trained to drive a water truck, given that they were "already trained to drive a fire engine." She stated that while personnel from the Rapid Response Unit and the fire department were contemplating the move, business places in the Manchester capital are being burnt to the ground, while losing millions of dollars in the process.
She said that it would be difficult to attract investments into Mandeville because the basic amenities cannot be guaranteed. She questioned why persons should want to invest their money in an area where the water supply is poor and where there is a difficulty being faced by those who are to protect life and property. She said the residents of Mandeville are facing a precariously dangerous crisis and urgent steps had to be taken to have it addressed.
Mrs. Porteous pointed out that Minister of State at the Ministry of Water and Housing Harry Douglas promised the town of Mandeville $50 million out of an estimated $115 million to start a plan for water for that town, which should have been implemented years ago.
She is once again calling on the Water Ministry to allocate all of the $115 million immediately so that an intended threeyear implementation time can be brought forward. Mrs. Porteous has also called for one of the water trucks from the Rapid Response fleet in Mandeville to be parked at the fire station "every night and on weekends."
Ms. Porteous, however, commended the fire-fighters from the Mandeville Fire Department for fighting the fire at so gallantly at YZ Industries with limited resources.
