Federal Fire Service warns against attacks on personnel

Aidoghie Paulinus, Abuja

The Controller-General of the Federal Fire Service, Ibrahim Liman, has warned against attacks on personnel of the service while discharging their duties.

Liman gave the warning in Abuja during the unveiling of the Skytick Advance Fire Fighting Technology MPM-400.

Liman said the service is doing its best with the State Fire Service to educate members of the public, but what it is receiving from the public is very disappointing.

“Any time our men turn out to fight, they don’t know from which station they are coming, they start stoning them, injuring our staff and the equipment,” Liman complained.

“But I have warned before now and I am still warning, any area that is not friendly to us, if there is fire, we will not respond unless the elders in that place talk to the youths because we cannot afford to lose our firemen, we cannot afford the destruction of our very expensive equipment.

“So, I am appealing to the youths in these areas to please be friendly with our fire fighter anytime they respond to fire fighting call,” Liman said.

He added that he might take the next action of not responding in case of emergency in any area that is unfriendly.

Speaking earlier after the demonstration of the new fire fighting technology, Liman said the Advanced Fire Fighting Technology, a form of rapid intervention, will aid the service in areas that are not accessible by big trucks.

“And from what we have seen from the demonstration, we are satisfied,” Liman said.

Explaining the capacity of the Skytick Advance Fire Fighting Technology MPM-400, the Director of Advanced Firefighting Technology (AFT), Middle East and Africa, Engineer Nabil Saad, said the equipment is the latest in fire fighting technology.

Saad added that the equipment, which contains 300 litres of water, when going out of its gun, gives performance equals to 15,000 litres and has the capacity of three big trucks.

“It can go for the small areas, it can go very faster, it will be the most economical solution for the fire fighting,” Saad said.