Power upsurge, poor cable system cause of Manso Aponapon disaster - GNFS

Correspondence from Ashanti Region:

The Ashanti Regional Public Relations Officer for the Ghana National Fire Service (GNFS), DO3 Desmond Acquah has revealed that the Manso Aponapon fire outbreak that burnt a family of four to death, was caused by a poor cable system and a power upsurge.

According to him, the problem was caused when there was an upsurge in power after the lights were brought back from an outage.

He said, due to the weak nature of the cables, they are not able to carry the strength of light when there's an upsurge in power.

"There was a high current when the lines were brought back after an outage. It is believed that the fire broke in when the weak cables could not withstand the strong upsurge in power," He said.

He explained that some of the electric wires were torched after the light was switched on, and this caused the fire outbreak.

He disclosed that fire service officers got the information of the outbreak around 11:55pm on Saturday. But trying to get to the area, the personnel found it very difficult to quicken their speed as was expected due to the bad nature of the road.

A family of four was sadly burnt to death following a fire outbreak at Manso Aponapon in the Amansie South District of the Ashanti.
The fire which destroyed the eight-bedroom apartment house was survived by four other tenants who sustained degree of injuries, with the four family members burnt to death.

The victims of the inferno include Mr. Kofi Owusu, his pregnant wife, Esther Kobina, and their two children. The children are believed to be five(5) and nine(9) years of age.

The bodies have since been deposited at the St. Martin's hospital at Manso Agroyesum.

Mr. Acquah in an exclusive interview with the Ghanaweb revealed that the four others who sustained injuries are currently responding to treatment.

DO3 Desmond Acquah however made a humble appeal to the authorities to always make sure roads that link to the various places are tarred or well constructed to ease movement.

He also urged the general public to always see experts when fixing security entry points such as windows and doors so that they are taught to leave emergency exit points.

He also admonished that landlords should always consult service personnel for advise whenever they're wiring a house.

"Our intelligence sadly reveals that several attempts by the family to escape fire through the window or door was proven futile because there was no emergency exit point. The wiring too was poorly done.
There's the belief that things wouldn't have gone this way had there been any expert's prior advise," He concluded.