Bihar: RPF jawan killed in fire extinguisher blast when he tried dousing a fire in train

The sudden blast in the S-8 compartment triggered panic at the railway station, while the fire extinguisher explosion exacerbated the situation

A Railway Protection Force (RPF) jawan was killed after a fire extinguisher exploded when he was trying to douse a fire that broke out in a sleeper coach of the Valsad-Muzaffarpur (19051) Shramik Express at Muzaffarpur junction on Monday morning. Police said a short circuit triggered the fire in the train after all passengers de-boarded.

Representational image.

According to Amresh Kumar, the principal chief security commissioner of East Central Railway (ECR), who arrived at the spot, the incident took place around 7am. “The jawan, identified as Binod Kumar Yadav, was injured after the rear end of the fire extinguisher hit his face after exploding. He succumbed to his injury on the way to the hospital.”

The sudden blast in the S-8 compartment triggered panic at the railway station, while the fire extinguisher explosion exacerbated the situation, forcing people to flee the place. A fire tender was pressed in action immediately after the incident.

“The contractor of the train has violated fire safety norms. It appears that they did not do any maintenance of the fire extinguishers, which led to the blast,” inspector Surendra Prasad Singh, fire official of Samastipur, said.

“If pressure testing of extinguishers is not done properly, there are always chances of the extinguishers going off. Maintenance of the equipment also comes under the fire safety norms,” he said.

ECR chief public relation officer Birendra Kumar confirmed that there was no sign of sabotage and called it a mishap. “The Railways has ordered an enquiry to ascertain the exact cause of the incident. All evidence collected from the site has been sent for forensic examination,” the CPRO added.