Mayor of Santos asks federal government for help.

SP 247 - The Mayor of Santos, on the coast of São Paulo, Paulo Alexandre Barbosa, gave a press conference this Saturday (4) and tried to reassure the population regarding a possible evacuation due to the fire that hit an industry in the Alemoa neighborhood on Thursday (2). He said that the information about a possible removal of residents is not true and revealed that he asked for help from the federal government, according to a publication by the G1 portal.

The fire in the fuel tanks of the company Ultracargo started around 10 am last Thursday (2) and affected six fuel tanks, and around 18 pm this Saturday, four were still on fire. The temperature at the site reaches 800°C and there is still no deadline for the end of the work. By this Saturday, firefighters had used four billion liters of seawater.

According to firefighters, no one died in the fire. At least 15 people working at the site, including employees and firefighters, required medical attention after inhaling smoke. All have since been released.

Barbosa asked Vice President Michel Temer (PMDB) for help on Saturday afternoon (4), but explains that the situation has not worsened.

"I spoke with the vice-president requesting support from the federal government for more equipment and resources to fight the fire. We had one truck from Petrobras, now we will have three more trucks arriving, in addition to three other auxiliary equipment. There will be seven trucks in total. Periodic meetings were held during the operation, and the order is to use all possible resources. Monitoring at that time showed that these new resources were not necessary, but that is no longer the case; the situation has changed, which does not mean it has worsened," says the mayor.