Moghbazar Blast: 2 days later, the body of the caretaker was discovered

The body blames methane, and cops are investigating.

Another body was retrieved from the debris Tuesday, two days after an explosion in a building in the capital’s Moghbazar, bringing the total death toll to eight.

Harun-or-Rashid, the 71-year-old victim, worked as the building’s caretaker.

Harun had been missing since the blast on Sunday evening, according to Debashis Bardhan, deputy director (operations and maintenance) of Fire Service and Civil Defence. Around 3:30 p.m., firefighters discovered his dead while inspecting the rubble on the ground floor.

“We’ll hand the body over to the cops…,” he continued.

Meanwhile, unidentified people were charged with causing fatalities by negligence by police at Ramna Police Station yesterday.

Harun Or Rashid, assistant deputy commissioner of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s Ramna division, informed journalists that police were looking into whether the building’s owner, caretakers, or traders were negligent.

It will also be investigated to see if the traders in the building have been negligent in their storage or administration of goods, he added.

METHANE GAS BLAMED

Md Asaduzzaman, who heads a seven-member police commission tasked with determining the cause of the explosion, stated Wednesday that the Moghbazar blast occurred in the presence of methane gas.

According to him, a gas detecting machine discovered 12-13 percent methane gas at the location.

“I believe the stored gas came into touch with air and generated an explosive mixture, resulting in a massive explosion,” he explained.

Huge blasts only happen when the mixer is over 15%, he added.

While visiting the scene, Asaduzzaman, who is also the chief of the Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) section, told reporters, “Now the probe committee is trying to figure out the source of the gas.”

He stated that the reason of the explosion would be revealed in greater detail later.

He was accompanied by explosives experts from the CTTC’s Bomb Disposal Unit.

In response to another question, he stated that no evidence of an IED was discovered.

Md Tanjid, a rickshaw-van driver, said he smelled gas about an hour before the blast while taking some electronic products from an appliance store on the building’s first level.

After the tragedy on Sunday, six persons were found dead, and another died of his injuries the next morning. Over 50 people were injured, with many of them being passengers in three buses engaged in a traffic gridlock on the popular Outer Circular Road.

The explosion smashed the windows of numerous neighboring buildings, and broken bricks, walls, shutters, and other debris flew into the nearby road, injuring people.

Five victims are being treated at Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery, according to Samanta Lal Sen, the institute’s coordinator. In the ICU, three of them were fighting for their lives with 90 percent burns.