The Assistant Controller General and Zonal Commander in charge of the Zone, Mr Chika Njoku, disclosed this to the News Agency of Nigeria in Lagos on Thursday.
NAN reports that the zone comprises Lagos, Oyo, and Ogun states.
Njoku said that the zone had 22 fire calls within the period under review with 13 successfully put out, and 20 persons saved during the operations.
He said that within the same month, properties estimated at N384.1 million were lost to fire in the three states, adding that Lagos had the highest fire incidents with 14 cases, where 12 persons were saved.
He said nine other persons were rescued from other disasters, while properties estimated at about N345 million were reportedly lost and N1.2 billion items were also saved.
Njoku said Oyo had eight fire cases, with eight lives saved from the incidents, eight others rescued from other disasters, with N38.4 million estimated properties lost to fire, while more than N296 million others were saved.
The ACG said no fire incident happened in Ogun and no life was lost to fire from the states in August.
According to the ACG, there were fewer fire calls in August 2023 than in August 2022 due to some proactive drive in various enlightenment lectures on media and other means to members of the public on causes and prevention of fire outbreaks.
“The continuous awareness fire campaign run by the Prevention, Regulatory and Inspectorate Unit on fire prevention really helped.
“This was made possible as a result of synergy and working relationship we have built over the years with our sister agencies to assist us in extinguishing fire in areas where we could not reach on time.”
Njoku noted that in August 2022, the zone recorded 39 fire incidents, with Lagos recording 30 cases, Ogun five, and Oyo State recording four.
He said properties estimated at N352.6 million were lost during that period, while others worth about N2.2 billion were saved.
The zonal commander said within that period, 11 persons were saved during fire operations, with eight others rescued from other disasters in Lagos State.
He added that properties estimated at N245,370,000 million were lost and about N780,300,000 million estimated properties saved in 2022.
Njoku said five fire cases were recorded in Ogun, while properties estimated at N65 million were lost and others estimated at N1.2 billion saved.
He said Oyo State recorded four fire incidents, one death, properties estimated at N42 million lost, and about N172 million other properties saved.
NAN