No sooner did summer set in than the Capital started witnessing a rise in the number of fire incidents. On Tuesday, the National Museum of Natural History in the FICCI complex also became just one of the many public buildings to face huge destruction and losses due to a massive fire that went on a rampage for more than four hours.
According to experts from School of Planning and Architecture (SPA) the major causes of fire in public buildings are overloaded electrical components, poor maintenance, old electrical wires, overheated electrical devices causing short circuits which witness a major spurt during summers as the high temperatures and dry weather not only results in overloading of electrical devices but also facilitate quick fires.
Professor Manoj Mathur, Head, Department of Architecture (SPA) says: “In most of our buildings, the electrical installations are not properly ventilated and are put in closures. Delhi summers, that are intense and dry, lead to more overheating of these installations thus causing fire.”
Dr Virendra Kumar Paul, HOD, Building Engineering and Management says: “Because of the current needs, by mistake or oversight, we tend to overload the system by applying more electrical appliances to the plugs which otherwise have a fixed flow of current which in turn leads to a short circuit.”