Ilie Bolojan, about the cause of the tragedy in Rahova. “It was definitely a gas leak. Someone reopened the seal”

“When such tragedies happen, we find that a small part of the houses are insured”, said Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan in his first reaction after the explosion in Rahova, in an interview with Radio Romania Actualității. He also explained the events that could have led to the tragedy.

“It was definitely a gas leak,” said Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan in the RRA interview. He also explained what is the responsibility of the supplier, respectively of the owners' association, and said that it is likely that the explosion was caused by the fact that a person broke the Distrigaz seal that stopped the supply to the entire block.

“Up to the property limit of the block, the gas network was responsible for the concessionaire in the respective sector, the Distrigaz company. From the property limit inwards, the owners' association is responsible for all utilities”, explained the prime minister.

He said that the gas leaks were inside the block, and Distrigaz was notified and came to the scene the day before, to stop the gas supply.

“From the records that are made at the Distrigaz operator's control rooms, they were alerted that there was a problem, they went there the day before, they found that there really are problems inside, they stopped the gas supply to that block, they sealed the blocking component. They were also called this morning, they went there again, they found that the seal was no longer in place. So it is very likely that someone intervened and basically reopened the power inside the block. Immediately after the team was there, this explosion was generated”, said Ilie Bolojan.

Contradictions between authorities

The State Secretary of the MAI, Raed Arafat, and the National Energy Regulatory Authority (ANRE) presented different versions of what happened.

“Firemen shut off the gas supply until Distrigaz representatives arrived,” said Raed Arafat in a press conference at the MAI headquarters. This is after the explosion. But ANRE had officially communicated that Distrigaz arrived before the explosion and found the seal broken.

In a statement, ANRE claims that Distrigaz shut off the gas on Thursday, but on Friday, when it arrived before the explosion following another complaint, it found the seal broken. And then there was the explosion, ANRE said.

Also on Friday, about an hour after the ANRE statement, Raed Arafat held a press conference. He denied that Distrigaz came before the explosion and found that the seal was broken. The finding of the broken seal came, therefore, after the explosion, according to the data presented by Arafat.

The unfolding of the events, LIVE on HotNews.