The Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas on Wednesday said that around 1600 families had already been evacuated from the nearby affected areas of Baghjan Oilfield in Tinsukia and are camped in relief camps.
The Ministry said that OIL has decided to provide an amount of Rs 30,000 to each of the affected families as immediate relief.
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Officials said that Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan held a review meeting through Video Conferencing on Wednesday with the crisis management team located at the site, officials of OIL India Ltd and Ministry officials.
It has been reported that except at the well plinth area, the fire around the site has mostly extinguished. However, the burning of gas at the well mouth will continue until the well is capped.
It may be mentioned here that while carrying out workover operations in the Gas Producing Well Baghjan-5 under Baghjan Oilfield in Tinsukia district, the well suddenly became active on May 27 and a blowout occurred on June 9.
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It led to the uncontrolled flow of gas from the well.
OIL India sought support from ONGC, which immediately deployed their Crisis Management Team (CMT).
OIL also mobilized a Singapore based firm M/s Alert Disaster Control.
The fire in around 200 meters periphery has completely burnt about 15 houses, while another 10-15 houses have been partially affected.
It is also reported that two firemen of Oil India Ltd have died. Preliminary information indicates that three firemen, two from OIL India, and one from ONGC jumped in a water pool nearby.
While ONGC fireman got injured, two OIL India firemen could not save themselves. Their bodies have been retrieved.
The debris of burnt rig, fire engines and other material around the well site will be removed before any operation can be started to cap the well.
Arrangements of continuous water supply will have to be made before activities are undertaken at the site which is likely to take 5-6 days to make these arrangements, and all the operations will take about 4 weeks to complete.