The Gua­napo Land­fill was closed yes­ter­day af­ter a fire, which be­gan Sat­ur­day, con­tin­ued to blaze yes­ter­day.

In a state­ment, the T&T Sol­id Waste Man­age­ment Com­pa­ny Ltd (SWM­COL) ad­vised that the fire be­gan on Sat­ur­day in the vicin­i­ty of the ac­tive tip­ping area.

SWM­COL said due to the na­ture and lo­ca­tion of the fire, the land­fill was closed yes­ter­day. All waste haulers who utilise the site, were di­rect­ed to oth­er land­fills.

SWM­COL al­so ad­vised peo­ple liv­ing in near­by com­mu­ni­ties, es­pe­cial­ly those with res­pi­ra­to­ry con­di­tions, to ex­er­cise cau­tion be­cause of the lev­el of smoke em­a­nat­ing from the land­fill.

But St Au­gus­tine MP Khadi­jah Ameen called on the Gov­ern­ment to “take im­me­di­ate and de­ci­sive ac­tion to ad­dress the alarm­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal haz­ards plagu­ing the La Re­treat/Heights of Gua­napo area man­aged by SWM­COL.”

The MP, in a state­ment, said the nox­ious fumes from the fire have been af­fect­ing the eyes, nose, throats and lungs of res­i­dents forc­ing them to flee their homes and oth­ers to seek med­ical at­ten­tion.

Ameen called for Gov­ern­ment to take “swift and de­ci­sive ac­tion to rec­ti­fy the sit­u­a­tion.”

She added, “Im­me­di­ate mea­sures must be im­ple­ment­ed to mit­i­gate pol­lu­tion and en­sure the health and safe­ty of res­i­dents are pri­ori­tised.”