A storage facility in Happy Acres, East Coast Demerara was incinerated after a fire which followed an explosion engulfed the two-storey building.
“I was looking at the television around 9-9.30 Saturday night when I hear boom. By the time I hear boom I run outside and the whole place engulf in fire and started to cave in. I was very scared so I rushed to my cars that were parked in the yard and moved them further away from the flames,” a neighbour told Stabroek News yesterday.
“The heat was tremendous and unbelievable. All my windows started to crack and break and I couldn’t stand it. I had to move away too as the fire blazed on,” she related, going on to describe how within mere minutes the firetrucks raced passed her to the scene.
She said that while two firetrucks tried valiantly to fight the fire, they could not save the building which was almost completely destroyed in minutes.
While the building would usually have several guards, there was no one there when the fire started. Although the origins of the fire are still unknown, neighbours claimed that several minutes before the building went up in flames they smelled a strong odour of gasoline coming from the vicinity of the building.
“As far as we know it was used for storage, and earlier in the morning there was a lot of people going and coming from the building, but that isn’t unusual. We don’t know all the people but we are accustomed to seeing a few faces here and there,” the neighbour said, although she added that the guards had not been seen in a few days. To the best of her knowledge, she said, the guards were on leave at the moment.
Stabroek News was unable to confirm the identity of the owner of the building, but according to the neighbours the building is owned by a well-known businessman. Stabroek News also understands that the building was one of the first to be erected in the community and was valued over $30M.
