\u201cBetween 40 to 50 shacks in the Marathon informal settlement were destroyed in a blaze.\u201d<\/p>\n
This was the report the Germiston City News received from an anonymous caller, on Thursday, September 11.<\/p>
The caller alleged the fire took place on Wednesday night, and that the responding fire departments took too long to arrive on scene.<\/p>\n
When they did arrive, they allegedly were unable to battle the blaze, because they had no water.<\/p>
\u201cThe lack of organisation caused the level of destruction to be greater than it should have been,\u201d the caller said.<\/p>\n
The GCN approached the Ekurhuleni Disaster and Emergency Management Services in an attempt to confirm this account of events.<\/p>\n
William Ntladi, media liaison officer, released the following statement: \u201cA multiple shack fire call was received at around 7.47pm on Wednesday, September 10.<\/p>\n
\u201cThree stations were activated to assist in the incident; mainly Primrose, as the primary response station, backed up by the Bedfordview and Edenvale fire stations, respectively.<\/p>\n
\u201cThree patients were given pre-hospital medical treatment, prior to transportation to Bertha Gxowa Hospital, in Germiston, by ambulance, for care of minor burn wounds and smoke inhalation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe police had to be called to intervene, due to the vicious reaction by the community towards the fire fighters.<\/p>\n
\u201cSmaller grass unit vehicles had to be used to reach the burning site of the informal settlement; bigger vehicles had a challenge as far as the widths of the roads are concerned.<\/p>\n
\u201cSubsequent to that, water had to be shuttled in between the two points.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe smaller grass unit vehicles had a smaller tank capacity of about 800lt of water, which is not enough, hence their tanks were running empty.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat didn`t mean we had no water on scene at all.<\/p>\n
\u201cSubsequent to the violent reaction of the community members, firefighters felt intimidated and couldn`t exercise their duties effectively.<\/p>\n
\u201cThanks so much to the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT-Programme) members from the same community of the Marathon informal settlement, who assisted in extinguishing the blazes.\u201d<\/p>\n