Firefighters in Osun State have bemoaned the terrible condition of the roads leading to Alekuwodo in Osogbo, where a fire on Thursday damaged two buildings and millions of naira’s worth of property.
The two afflicted structures, a single-story and a multi-story structure next to each other that stored materials for furniture and interior design, were completely destroyed.
Around 2:00 a.m., smoke was reportedly seen coming from one of the buildings, according to locals.
Firefighters bemoaned the lack of access routes needed to battle the blaze from several angles and attributed the extent of the damage to the delay in requesting their assistance.
Residents were seen mourning their losses while firefighters worked to put out the fire.
Isaac Adejobi, the Operational Commander of the Federal Fire Service in Osun, said that his office was informed around 2:30am after some locals trying to put out the fire had run out of options.
He said, “We arrived at exactly 2:30am after receiving a distress call. The fire must have started earlier and no one called us until 2:30am. Our office is just about 2km away and we turned out immediately we got the call.
“People were fighting the fire on their own before calling fire service. It was when the fire was beyond their control that they called us.”
The Osun Fire Service’s Public Relations Officer, Ibrahim Adekunle, also said that the poor layout of the affected buildings prevented firemen from entering them from behind, which hindered their efforts to put out the fire.
Adekunle warned residents living nearby not to move too close to the affected buildings because they were weak and could collapse, adding that the cause of the fire was still unknown. He also stated that the fire had been contained.
