Pune: 3 workers die while cleaning sewage tank in Wagholi society

PUNE: Three workers died while cleaning a sewage tank at Solacia Housing Society (phase-II) near Wagheshwar temple on BAIF Road in Wagholi, about 20km from here, around 6am on Friday.
Police suspect suffocation due to inhalation of poisonous gas inside the 20-ft tank was the probable cause of death. A preliminary postmortem report was awaited from Sassoon General Hospital.
The fire brigade and the police were also not ruling out the possibility of the workers having drowned as the tankhad 10ft of water and slurry. “Our team was able to recover two bodies within an hour, but the third body was traced and recovered around 11am,” Vijay Mahajan, Pune Metropolitan Region DevelopmentAgency’s (PMRDA) Wagholi fire station officer, told TOI.
“A medical opinion will establish the exact cause,” an officer from the Lonikand police said.
The deceased were identified as Nitin Gond (45) from Buldhana district, Ganesh Paikrao (28) from Nanded district and Satishkumar Chaudhari (35) from Uttar Pradesh.
Gond and Paikrao were working for a contractor hired by the society for operating the pumps of a sewage treatment plant (STP) and a water treatment plant. Chaudhari was a housekeeping worker and would also wash cars on the premises.
Deputy commissioner of police (zone-IV) Rohidas Pawar told TOI, “We will carry out an elaborate inquiry before taking a call on application of charges and arrests in the Wagholi society case.”
For now, the Lonikand police have registered an accidental death case and are investigating. Friday’s deaths are the second over the last seven months. On March 3, four men had died in a similar clean-up operation in the septic tank of a private residential building at Kadamwak Vasti near Loni Kalbhor.
Mahajan told TOI: “Our team rushed to the society soon after receiving a call relating to the incident around 7am. We found that the tank was about 20ft deep and filled with water and slurry up to10ft. The residents told us that Gond and Paikrao entered the tank using the ladder inside. When there was no response from them, Chaudhari too entered the tank to check what was happening. We suspect the three suffocated and drowned in the water.”
The fire officer said their team used hooks to trace the workers under the water. “It was risky for us to enter the tank as there were chances of poisonous gas inside and the silt was sticky like grease. After searching for an hour, we traced the bodies of Chaudhari and Gond,” Mahajan said. Paikrao’s body was traced around 11am.