The Fire Brigade Department and Breakdown Service in PUC (Public Utilities Corporation) are on a 24-hour alert since the heavy rains of Wednesday and are being called out to assist in a number of minor disasters all over the island.

From 4 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon to 8 a.m. yesterday morning, the Fire Brigade dealt with six cases and twice referred callers to other authorities such as the Forestry and Land Transport divisions.

During the night of Wednesday, the Fire Brigade were called out on two separate occasions to clear roads and remove debris from fallen cinnamon trees at La Gogue.

They also helped in cutting down a tree which had damaged a store at Takamaka and got rid of another one which had narrowly missed a house at Belvedère.

On Thursday at dawn while a team of firemen were called upon to clear off a fallen tree at State House, another was trying to tackle a landslide behind a private house at Ma Constance, a task which they nevertheless postponed to later during the day.

As for the Breakdown Service in PUC, they were busy mainly restoring or replacing damaged electricity poles or cables so as not to interrupt supply for too long.

From Wednesday afternoon to early Thursday morning, they twice replaced burnt-out poles with new ones at Takamaka and Anse à la Mouche and once straightened a fallen pole at Bel Air.

Electricity connections in these regions were interrupted only briefly.

In two separate incidents on Thursday morning PUC dispatched men on a site at Anse Forbans where a coconut tree had fallen on electricity cables and at Les Mamelles where a fallen Santol tree had knocked down a pole with all its adjoining cables.

A strong team was needed at Les Mamelles to cut off the tree, repair the cables and install a new pole.

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