He was not on duty, but that did not prevent Mumbai’s circumspect deputy Chief Fire Officer PS Rahangdale from swinging into action and contributing his mite to reduce the gravity of the disaster on Wednesday.
Even as the Naval fire brigade battled with the blaze, Rahangdale alerted and requisitioned maximum resources from the city fire brigade and supplemented the efforts of the Naval team in not only dousing the massive blaze but also in preventing the spread of fire to a second submarine docked in the vicinity of INS Sindhurakshak. “In fact, I was off-duty and while returning home from a gymnasium, I saw a huge explosion. Immediately I sent a message to our fire control room. Because of my past experience, I realised from whatever I saw that the mishap is going to be a big one. Immediately, we deployed our maximum resources,” Rahangdale recalled.
“After taking permission of my boss, I also got onto the job. Once I reached the mishap site, I found one submarine was engulfed in flames and a second one was about to catch fire. The leaping flames were 10 to 15 feet away from the second submarine which was docked in the vicinity of INS Sindhurakshak.
“What we --- our fire personnel together with the Navy’s fire brigade that was already on the job --- created eight to nine water curtains and attacked the fire that was about to engulf the second submarine. In the process, we isolated the second vessel from catching fire,” Rahangdale said. “The strategy worked, and within 45 minutes, the Naval team managed to tow away the second submarine to safety. The fire operation on INS Sindhurakshak continued for three and half hours,” Rahangdale said.
Choosing not to take full credit for averting what a situation that would have led to fire on the second vessel, Rahangdale said: “Along with the timely intervention of my fire personnel and the efforts by the Navy fire brigade, we could prevent a second mishap”. While the Naval fire brigade was in full force, the Mumbai Fire Brigade had deployed 16 fire engines and several dozens of water tankers to assist the Navy fire brigade. The Mumbai Port Trust’s fire brigade personnel were also on the spot to assist fire fighting operations.
Rahangdale is not new dealing with major fire disasters. During the 26/11 attacks on Mumbai, Rahangdale had come in the line of fire of terrorists who set off two explosions at Oberoi-Trident entrances. They had managed to rescue 120 guests trapped in the fire that raged in the hotel lobby on the night of Nov 26, 2008 and another rescued another 200 trapped guests from the hotel on the second day.
“In a normal fire, danger is always lurking. But, when you have ammunition and equipments on board a ship, we were working in within the radius of danger. Fortunately, there was so much back-up available. There was enough water supply and no dearth of resources as we co-ordinated the operation with the Navy and Mumbai Port Trust teams,” Rahangdale said. On his part, Chief of Naval Staff Admiral DK Joshi revealed the flames from INS Sindhurakshak, which later sank, touched the outer casing of the second submarine, but the vessel was quickly taken to safety without any major damage.
“There was a submarine immediately ahead of INS Sindhurakshak. The other submarine was under sailing orders immediately after midnight. When this incident was taking place, that submarine had cast off and proceeded onto its task. There were other units berthed in closer vicinity to the affected submarines. These units either using their own power or through tugs were taken to safety. There were no other issues as far as we are concerned, “Admiral Joshi said, thus seeking to put things in a perspective.