Mumbai: A leak was detected from a tanker carrying approximately 35,000 litres of benzene near Mysore Colony Monorail station in Chembur on Monday night, causing panic in the area. No one was injured in the incident which took place around 8pm, said officials.Senior station officer K V Shirke and station officer Sagar Khopde led the fire brigade team that swung into action and created a 500m buffer zone as decanting of benzene from the affected tanker into an empty tanker was completed successfully. Traffic was stopped on Mysore Colony Road and Mahul Road and operations at Mysore Colony Monorail station were halted during this period.“The driver of the tanker, which had left from BPCL refinery premises, informed the authorities about the leak from the flange of the draining system, which is attached to the tanker body,” said a fire brigade official. “Initially, we carried out water fogging on both sides of the tanker to ensure that no vapour cloud was formed due to the benzene leak. We wanted to ensure that no spark travelled and no ignition was caused as benzene is highly flammable and combustible.”“A HAZMAT vehicle was pressed into service and we decanted benzene from the leaking first compartment of the tanker, which has five compartments, to another tanker. After decanting, we moved both the tankers to the saffe control section of the BPCL refinery,” said the fire brigade official.Rupesh Madhavi, a Shiv Sena (UBT) activist, said that chemical tankers are usually double parked illegally on roads in the vicinity of residential areas. A little away from the spot there is a school, where international level gymnasts practice. “We had warned residents that they may have to shift in case of an eventuality. However, the situation was brought under control,” he said. ” Around 2,000 chemical tankers are parked on the roads in the area. Local corporator Snehal Shivkar has been demanding that a truck terminus be developed by the BMC for parking chemical tankers.” In another incident, a tanker carrying glacial acetic acid tilted after getting stuck in a roadside chamber on LBS Marg in Mulund West. No leakage was detected. The incident was reported near Vaishali Nagar at 8.52pm. A fire brigade team and ward office officials reached the spot and efforts were underway to pull out the tanker with the help of a crane.
