Rwalpind-Huge fire engulfed two plazas and five vehicles when an oil tanker caught fire after turning turtle yesterday here at Gulraiz Housing Society.

Luckily, no human casualty was reported. The unrest gripped the whole area. Traffic police blocked all the roads leading towards the incident place triggering traffic jam in the city.

Till filing of this report, the fire fighters were busy extinguishing the fire.

According to sources and police, the loaded oil tanker was going to supply fuel to some petrol station in Gulraiz when all of sudden it skidded off the road and overturned. As a result, the oil started spilling out of tanker and caught fire, they said. The citizens and traders called the fire fighters and other rescue departments to extinguish fire. However, the fire was so powerful that it spread and engulfed two commercial plazas. The rescue and fire fighting teams evacuated 27 people trapped in the plazas and shifted them to safe places. The fire also torched five cars and a motorcycle parked along road, they said.

WAPDA immediately suspended power supply to the locality. The rescuers faced difficulties in fire extinguishing operation due to rush of people.

“Thick black smoke clouds were emitting from the site which terrorised us,” said Amir Shehbaz, a local while talking to The Nation. He said, “We feared some terror related incident occurred in the city.” He said movement of such dangerous vehicles in residential areas is posing threats to the population. He demanded the government to shift petrol pumps out of the residential areas.

Punjab police and officials of other law enforcement agencies also rushed to the scene and cordoned off the area.

SSP (Operations) Irfan Tariq, when contacted, said according to reports the fire caught the oil tanker after it overturned; however, the reason behind fire would be determined soon.

He said no casualty was reported in the inferno. He said an inquiry would be launched in the incident and action would be taken against the responsible.