Property worth millions of shillings was destroyed in a fierce fire that gutted a supermarket in Ruiru town, Kiambu County on Monday morning August 26, 2024.
The fast-spreading fire, which is said to have started at around 5 am, razed down a large section of the supermarket and destroyed items valued at millions of shillings.
According to residents, it all started with a power outage within the populous town when a generator was powered at the supermarket to restore lights.
The noise generator is however said to have begun producing uncertain smoke before it exploded triggering extensive fire from the shop’s kitchen to other sections of the heavily stocked supermarket.
According to residents, it took an hour for firefighters from both Kiambu town and Thika to arrive at the scene to help extinguish the ferocious fire that had already destroyed property leaving the owners counting huge losses.
They decried that the local government is facing a lot of challenges when it comes to response time and suppression of all forms of fire incidents and other emergencies occurring in the town since the town relies on help from Thika and Kiambu town stations.
Construction of an additional fire station in Ruiru, they said, would mean that more sub-counties would have firefighting substations hence making services easily available to the locals.
“We are asking the local government to expand its fire services to Ruiru town. We have said over the years as in most cases, our property is destroyed by fire before extinguishers arrive from other parts of the county. It is time that the county considers deploying a fire vehicle and other equipment in Ruiru town,” Eliud Nyongo, a resident said.
The station, he said, will help them to among other things respond to numerous emergencies, which include fire incidents, road traffic accidents, pit rescues, fuel spillage, landslides and building collapse among others.
