Two persons were killed and two others suffered injuries when an oxygen cylinder exploded at a re-filling unit in northeast Delhi’s Mustafabad area on Friday.
The deceased persons have been identified as Ganga Singh (30) and Firoz (28), both labourers working at the cylinder re-filling unit. The explosion was so massive that their body parts were blown apart, said a police officer. As there were only these two labourers inside the unit, no more deaths were reported, said police.
The injured were identified as two teenage girls who were believed to be heading towards a Government school in the area. They were rushed to a nearby hospital for first-aid, said police.
The owner of the re-filling unit also had to be admitted to hospital after a suspected heart attack, which he suffered after hearing about the explosion and the death of the workers, said police.
A case of negligence was registered, but the cause of the explosion was not ascertained, said police. According to police, the incident took place around 11.40 AM when Singh was loading the cylinders and Firoz was preparing papers for a particular supply, at the backyard of the single-storey re-filling unit.
Glass windows of nearby premises were shattered and the single-storey unit, along with the boundary walls in its backyard, partially collapsed in the impact of the blast, following which locals called up police and the fire department was informed.
While Singh, hailing from a village in Bihar, lived at the refilling unit, Firoz, a native of Uttar Pradesh, lived on the premises of a godown nearby.
The unit re-filled oxygen cylinders, mostly supplied to hospitals in the city.
Only one of the cylinders, suspected to be old and worn out, exploded but the others did not sustain any damage. Police are checking documents related to the re-filling unit and further investigating into the matter, said an official.