Special Correspondent
Kamorta, July 24: Sparks followed by minor fire inside Cabin Number 280 today triggered panic inside MF Samsun. The ship MF Samsun left for Port Blair yesterday night from Kamorta and early this morning at around 4.00 am this fire was reported.
According to horrified passengers, there is a electric socket nearly 2 feet below the window of the said cabin. Sources said that due to rain water was sipping from the window. Somehow the water entered the electric socket resulting in sparks followed by fire. The fire became weak automatically after 3-4 minutes but the whole cabin was full of smoke.
Sadly neither the smoke detector inside the cabin worked nor there was any CO2 fire extinguisher inside the cabin. Sources told that even close to the cabin number 280, there was no fire extinguisher.
Some passengers went to call the duty persons at the reception but there was no one in the reception of the ship. Finally a passenger called a known crew, who brought an electrician along and rectified the fault.
Thankfully the fire came under control automatically or else, it could have resulted in a major disaster at high sea.
Meanwhile, passengers also complained that during entire sailing the ship MF Samsun was tilted towards starboard side, which caused inconvenience to all passengers.
