A preliminary investigation has revealed that an unattended flame on a stove at a food booth located at the People’s Mall on Henry Street, Port-of-Spain, may have caused yesterday’s fire that left over 15 vendors and over 35 other street vendors counting their losses after most of their goods were destroyed.
Approximately 53 vendors from the People’s Mall were affected as a result of the fire, according to one of the directors at the People’s Mall Association Agnes Blackman.
An eyewitness, who wished not to be identified, said he usually does cleaning around the mall and had approached a woman at the food booth for soap. He said he was turned down and left but had fixed himself in a garage on the opposite side of the road.
“I see like she put something on the stove and then like she lock up to go to a nearby grocery. I then notice fire flames going up and down and then I hear a loud ‘voom’ like the gas tank explode,” the eyewitness said.
A fire officer who was on the scene yesterday confirmed they were told the fire likely started from a booth where the owner sells food but added that a team of Fire Prevention Officers will be carrying out further investigations. The officer said the woman from the food booth was in shock and left the scene after speaking with them.
Vendor Eleashel “Matrix” Noel, who is a leather craftsman, said his entire booth burnt to the ground.
“I got a call at about 8.01 am saying come quick that fire burn down my booth, but I said it was impossible because my booth was made from iron. By the time I got here, I see everything gone. All my leather material, bags, shoes everything burn up,” Noel said.
He, however, noted that whilst he couldn’t estimate his losses, he is ready to rebuild.
Listen…my father used to sell here and I born and grow here selling too and I am 34 years. I have four children to take care of.”
But he slammed the responding fire officers for not doing their work properly, as he said he saw many of them walking around with their hoses lying on the ground.
In their defence, one of the fire officers told the T&T Guardian that initially, they had two issues – the electricity supply was not cut off as quickly as it should have, which caused horrific sparking of overhead lines and secondly, they had a challenge with low pressure from the hydrant.
Vendor Ida Oliver, 58, said she has been selling books and clothes at the mall for over 28 years.
“The majority of my books burnt…thousands of dollars in losses because one of the A-level books I sold at $2,300.”
Oliver described the fire as a “disaster,” especially given the fact that Christmas “is right around the corner.”
“We still have to be thankful that no lives were lost and no fire officers were injured.”
Oliver also disclosed that the fire originated from Nicole’s Kitchen but said that “accidents do happen.”
“I don’t think it was intentionally done but I have to ask the people to still be thankful that life goes on and we can rebuild. I feel it for another vendor who had her booth destroyed by a fire and she came here to re-start her business and now this too gone up in flames. I real sorry for her but in all this God is still good.”
Blackman said the first fire the People’s Mall experienced was in 2005.
“There were three more after that besides the fourth today, six months ago had a fire on this same spot but to the southern side of the area…vendors were affected but not as much as those affected this time.”
Blackman said whilst she did not want to pre-empt the investigation, she assured vendors that re-building will begin as early as next month.
“When I came I just got a tour of the area with the fire officers and I am yet to receive their official report but we will start to re-build early next month in time for the Christmas rush.”
This, in fact, was the sixth fire at the Drag Mall site. There were others in 2005, 2007, 2015, 2017 and one in June of this year. The fire in 2015 is the worst on record as the entire site was razed after a car battery exploded and led to a million-dollar fire which destroyed some 140 booths.
Investigations are continuing.