Thanjavur Fire and Emergency Safety Guide

Early on 27 April 2022, during a temple chariot procession at Kalimedu near Thanjavur, the chariot hit an obstacle while turning and was reversed into an overhead high-tension line. Eleven people died, three of them children, and the injured were taken to Thanjavur Medical College Hospital.

In July 2004, a fire that began in the kitchen, where lunch was cooked over a log fire under a thatched roof, killed 94 children at a school in Kumbakonam, in Thanjavur district. State investigators found no firefighting equipment and poor escape routes.

In mid November 2018, Cyclone Gaja crossed the coast at Vedaranyam and wrecked parts of Thanjavur district: walls collapsed on people, trees fell on houses and thatched and asbestos roofs were blown away. Deaths were reported around Pattukottai, Papanasam and Orathanadu, and more than 250 of about 300 mechanised fishing boats in the area were damaged or drifted off.

At about 2 am on 30 July 2026, a cooking gas cylinder kept in the thatched kitchen of a house exploded at Chinna Ammankudi near Thiruvonam while neighbours were trying to put out a fire. At least ten people, including a 15-year-old girl, were badly burnt, and seven were in the intensive care unit at Thanjavur Medical College Hospital.