Trauma ICU floods at SMS Hospital, 14 patients evacuated

Jaipur: Fourteen critically ill patients of intensive care unit (ICU) at the trauma centre of SMS Hospital were shifted to safer places following malfunction in the rooftop tank water supply system which led to flooding in the unit Monday night.The incident followed a tragic fire at the facility that claimed the lives of eight people in Oct 2025.
Principal secretary (Medical education) Gayatri Rathore inspected trauma centre Tuesday morning and reviewed the situation. Rathore said directions have been issued to prepare a checklist in the hospital and conduct regular monitoring of all technical systems, including plumbing, fire safety and electrical based on it daily. If any deficiency is found anywhere, it should be rectified with immediate effect. Such incidents should not recur in future, otherwise strict action will be taken against the concerned officials and agency, she said. Rathore directed the officials to conduct a thorough inspection of the hospital's plumbing, fire safety and electrical system in the next two days and submit a report. Follwing water leakage, the trauma centre administration first made arrangements to shift patients to a safer place to prevent any mortality. The hospital administration found that, before the construction of the ICU, the place was used as a cottage ward. The place where the pipe leaked was a bathroom of the cottage ward. Trauma centre in-charge B L Yadav said, "The engineers closed the pipeline in the bathroom for constructing the ICU, but they forgot to disconnect the pipeline from the rooftop water tank. The pipe was hidden in the wall, and no one knew about it. The pipeline leaked suddenly. After removing water, the ward was cleaned and then fumigation was done. The PWD engineers fixed the damage done to the ICU. Since leakage of water and repair work could cause infection, the ITO conducted fumigation of the ICU. The ICU remained non-functional Tuesday. The officials claimed that it will become operational from Wednesday.