Kolkata, March 16 -- The Fire and Emergency Services department with the assistance of Police Commissionerates is developing a mechanism to further reduce travel time of fire tenders to incident spots in the city.
"It is often alleged that fire tenders reached late at the fire spot. We held meetings with the top brass of the commissionerates of police and are working on a green corridor concept so that tenders can reach faster in case of a fire outbreak," said Sujit Bose, minister in-charge of Fire and Emergency Services department.
He added such a concept is being mulled for Kolkata, Bidhannagar, Barrackpore and Howrah police commissionerates' jurisdiction.
A Fire department official said a mechanism is being developed where an emergency call to the department's control room will simultaneously reach police control room.
This will allow police to create a green corridor for the fire tenders. GPS trackers will be installed on the tenders so their real-time location can be tracked.
Firefighting motor cycles have been launched, fitted with 15 litres water container and foam. These can access narrow lanes and by-lanes, particularly in rural areas.
"My Assembly Constituency has 17 Gram Panchayats. Most of the roads are narrow posing difficulty for big fire tenders. In village fairs, these fire-fighting motorcycles proved to be effective," said Abhijit Singha, MLA of Labhpur in Birbhum.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.