Around 12:30 pm this afternoon the Fire Services Department (FSD) and the Police Emergency Unit responded to a report of a grass fire on a footpath between houses and the Catholic Cemetery in Tan Cheung Upper Village.
When Sai Kung Buzz correspondent and Neighbourhood Watch Co-ordinator Guy Shirra arrived on the scene five minutes later, the FSD were attempting to extinguish the blaze with buckets of water loaned from the household opposite.
When asked why they were not running a hose form the fire hydrant up the path on the road 50 m away, they said they were going to.
When Guy got there, two firemen were battling with the fire hydrant which was inoperable and in any case they only had one 25 m section of hose with them.
Guy had made a report to Sai Kung FSD about the fire hydrant three months or so ago as it had been knocked down by a lorry. FSD passed the matter to the Water Supplies Department to get it repaired. This they did within a week or so. But – nobody it seems from Sai Kung FSD actually tested it.
If we had a real house fire here, the house would presumably burn down completely due to this unacceptable situation.
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