Firefighter Lost His Life in Huge Blaze

The firefighter who had died while on mission, was 28-years old Ivan Nogailîc. He was working with the Civil Protection and Exceptional Cases Department since 2009, his last position being that of the team leader of the Rescue and Firefighting Squad of the Republican Center for Operative Intervention with the SPC SE, as rescue first sergeant. In order to save the life of the firefighter caught in the debris, the rescuing colleagues tried for more than an hour, but unsuccessfully.

The emergency call was recorded at 09:58, on Friday, November 11th 2016, with the info that a fire had started on 9 Uzinelor street, in Chișinău. After the intervention of the first teams, it soon became clear that this was a huge blaze, being thus considered a third degree fire. A fire at a plastics depot which was covering thousands of square kilometers in a multi-story building. Thus, in order to put it out, there were deployed twelve fire fighting vehicles and two auto ladders with over 70 firefighters and rescuers. The flames had engulfed the fourth floor of a depot, over a huge area, which was not yet assessed. During the extinguishing mission, in parallel was triggered the search-and-rescue action since there was communication about a person being trapped on that floor.

Respectively, two people were rescued by the firefighters and brought to hospital. Two firefighters needed medical assistance and another rescuer died, after having been trapped inside.

The rescuers intervened for more than 30 hours in order to put out the devastating blaze. The whole situation was monitored on the scene by the management of the Department for Exceptional Cases, being present the chief of Civil Protection and Exceptional Cases Department, rescue major general Mihail Harabagiu and the chief deputy, the chief of Rescue and Firefighting Department, rescue colonel Anatolie Viniciuc.

On the scene, on 9 Uzinelor street, the intervention lasted 30 hours, with twenty-five fire fighting vehicles, out of which six auto ladders, with 150 firefighters and rescuers. At the hospital were brought six firefighters in need of medical assistance.

The fire was finally extinguished at 13:35, on Saturday November 12th 2016. Four teams of firefighters intervened in order to put out the last burning points and also to search for a woman who had supposedly been trapped in the building. The missing woman was not found.

On the fire scene the employees of the Anti-fire experimental Lab will continue their work in order to take samples and establish the exact cause of fire.

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