Marakwet residents use mineral water, soda to combat fire

Residents of Elgeyo Marakwet County spent the better part of Friday dawn battling a fire at a shopping centre using soda and mineral water from shops.

It took three hours for the residents of Chebera Shopping Center in Iten to put out the fire that gutted down  business premises.  Reports say the Friday 2am fire might have been caused by an electric fault.

Residents say they were forced to use mineral water and soda that was in one of the affected shops to put out the fire as it was hard to get water. The ChaberaDam that was within their reach was of no use either as they had no means of fetching  the water.

“Imagine, us trying to get water from the taps and there was none. We were forced to use mineral water and soda to put out the fire,” said one of the residents at the scene of the fire.

The residents accused the County fire brigade for failing to send a fire fighting engine to the scene leading to destruction of property worth millions of shillings.