Kakinada, Feb 18th: A major fire broke out at the American based company, Schlumberger situated at the industrial belt near Vakalapudi in the vicinity of the port here on Thursday. Nearly 100 workers were on duty when the mishap took place which created a confusion and tension among them. However, no casualties were reported but a few assets were damaged. Sub-Divisional Police Officer S Achyutha told that the actual loss of property was being assessed.

The cause of the fire at the industrial unit that supplies spare parts to shipping industry and also to the ONGC and other oil and gas companies, was said that  one of the three containers of the  lithium batteries exploded at around 11 am on the premises of the firm. Fortunately the fumes did not touch the ratio active materials kept nearly 10 meters away from the containers. It the same might have happened the loss could not be assessed both in the property wise and human wise.

Fire tenders from nearby NFCL, Coromandal units and the city were able to bring the flames under control after four hours by using limestone, dry-sand and graphite powder, as these kinds of fumes cannot be controlled alone with water. The revenue divisional officer, Mr. G.C Kishore Kumar, district fire officer, Mr. Yoseph rushed to the spot on hearing the news and examined the place where the fire broke out and ordered the company management to take all possible steps to recover as early as possible from the mishap.