Mumbai: Barely a month after Metro Line 3, also known as Water Line, between Aarey JVLR and Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) was opened to the public, a fire broke out on Friday afternoon at an entrance gate under construction of the BKC. station. Subway services in BKC were suspended for almost an hour and a half and some passengers and staff had to be evacuated due to smoke accumulation in the underground platform. The fire was extinguished in approximately two hours and no injuries were reported during the incident.

“The fire caused smoke to leak into the operational part of the station premises. Operations at BKC station have been suspended as a precautionary measure… Metro services in the rest of the stretch (Aarey JVLR to Bandra Colony) were operating normally,” said a statement issued by the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited (MMRCL) .

The fire broke out around 1 pm at a depth of 40-50 feet near the A4 construction entry/exit gate, MMRCL officials said. This was probably due to welding sparks falling on wooden construction materials at the site, said Mahendra Mithbaonkar, fire officer in charge of the division.

Although the fire was limited to wooden sheets, furniture and building materials, smoke began to escape from the entrance/exit door and filled the underground premises of the station, including the lobby, ticketing areas and platform.

Eight fire trucks were mobilized and firefighters had to descend through the portal pit under construction to bring the fire under control.

“We first tried to reach the basement using the metro cranes, then used a 46-meter-high ladder to reach the basement through the dug part on the ground,” explained Mithbaonkar. “Due to the smoke, we didn’t want to attack the fire only from the tunnels, we also chose to attack it from above. Water was thrown from all sides.

The fire was covered on all sides at 2:30 p.m. and extinguished at 3:11 p.m.

“Though there was no smoke at the other end of the station, as a preventive measure, we evacuated the low number of passengers and staff,” an MMRCL official said.

When HT visited the station after services resumed, technical staff were seen inspecting the escalators while maintenance staff cleared the platforms of water.

The incident occurred less than a week after a technical problem caused the subway to be stuck underground between two stations for nearly an hour on Saturday. Technical glitches in the train door closing system were common during the first week of commercial operation, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the water line on October 12. Heavy rains had also caused major leaks and waterlogging at the Kalina metro station in October.