Rhon­dor Dowlat

An of­fi­cial pho­to­graph re­leased by the Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny (NGC) CNG Lim­it­ed showed the CNG tank re­mains in­tact in the of­fi­cial school trans­port bus af­ter an in­ci­dent which left its dri­ver in a se­ri­ous con­di­tion at hos­pi­tal.

The pho­to­graph was re­leased to the T&T Guardian yes­ter­day as in­ves­ti­ga­tions con­tin­ue in­to the in­ci­dent which left In­dra Changar, 53, nurs­ing se­ri­ous in­juries to her body in­clud­ing her eyes.

Up to yes­ter­day, Changar re­mained hos­pi­talised at the Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex in Mount Hope.

Ac­cord­ing to NGC CNG’s com­mu­ni­ca­tions man­ag­er, Roger Sant pre­lim­i­nary in­ves­ti­ga­tions re­vealed that the “tank did not ex­plode. While there was an in­ci­dent, the CNG stor­age tank did not ex­plode.”

Sant al­so dis­put­ed the re­port ini­tial­ly giv­en to the T&T Guardian by one of Changar’s rel­a­tives that the tech­ni­cian, who in­stalled the CNG tank is NGC-ap­proved.

“Please note nei­ther NGC nor NGC CNG or any­one else oth­er than the Min­istry of En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries ap­proves con­vert­ers,” Sant said.

He added that to be­come a li­censed CNG con­vert­er, ap­pli­cants must go through a rig­or­ous ap­proval process which is sole­ly the purview of the Min­istry of En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries. “Once again, we state the tech­ni­cian is not “NGC-ap­proved,” Sant said.

As the in­ves­ti­ga­tions con­tin­ue in­to last month’s in­ci­dent, an in­de­pen­dent in­ves­ti­ga­tor – the Nat­ur­al Gas Ve­hi­cle In­sti­tute, which is a cer­ti­fied CNF Fu­el Sys­tem In­spec­tor, has been brought on­board to as­sist in the in­ves­ti­ga­tions to as­sess the ve­hi­cle’s CNG sys­tem.

The in­ves­ti­ga­tions are be­ing done by the Min­istry of En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries (MEEI), NGC CNG and Massy Au­to­mo­tive Com­po­nents Lim­it­ed (MACL).

On Sep­tem­ber 21, at about 5 am, Changar was get­ting ready to leave her home in Munroe Road, to go and pick up her school chil­dren pas­sen­gers. As soon as she opened the door of the van there was a loud ex­plo­sion which threw her against a wall.

Changar went un­con­scious for a few min­utes and when she re­gained con­scious­ness she found that her en­tire body was on fire and her clothes burnt off com­plete­ly.

Changar had the CNG tank in­stalled in her van on Sep­tem­ber 18 by a tech­ni­cian.

Af­ter in­stal­la­tion, Changar had to take it back on Sep­tem­ber 19 and Sep­tem­ber 20 to have “fi­nal works” done.

Changar had filled up the tank on the night of Sep­tem­ber 20 be­fore park­ing it in the garage area of her home.

Changar usu­al­ly trans­ports pupils of St Au­gus­tine Girls’ High School and Lak­sh­mi Girls’ Hin­du Col­lege.

Changar has been trans­port­ing school chil­dren for just over six years and had de­cid­ed to con­vert her ve­hi­cle to CNG af­ter a rec­om­men­da­tion by NGC.

In Sep­tem­ber 2017, NGC CNG Com­pa­ny Lim­it­ed be­gan to dis­trib­ute in­cen­tives to maxi taxi, taxi, and pri­vate school bus own­ers who have tran­si­tioned to CNG.