Around 45 minutes of a surgery was done under the lights of mobile phones and torches at the Calcutta Medical College and Hospital on Tuesday when power supply to one building of the government-run hospital was disconnected after a fire broke out.
The fire broke out in the server room on the first floor of the superspeciality building of the hospital around 2.45 pm. Postgraduate students of the medical college first detected the fire and alerted authorities.
“We had to switch off the power supply to the entire building to prevent any spread. But the surgery had started by then,” said an official of the hospital.
The operation theatre (OT) where the surgery to remove a woman’s tumor was underway is located on the second floor of the building where the fire broke out.
“Since the surgery had started, it could not have been postponed. Doctors present in the OT used the torches of their mobile phones and procured torches to go ahead with the surgery,” the official said.
He said the surgery started at 2pm and finished at 4.30pm. “Power was unavailable in the OT for nearly 45 minutes, between 2.45pm and 3.30pm. The final hour of the surgery was done when the power supply had been restored.”
“The surgery went well,” he said.
Three fire tenders doused the flames and brought things under control by 3.30pm.
“The first area where the power supply was restored was the OT,” said the official.
An official of the hospital said power supply to the OT should have been restored earlier.
“We tried our best to restore it as quickly as possible,” he said.