An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

The Fire­Pow­er Fire­works rep­re­sen­ta­tive who suf­fered third-de­gree burns when fire­works ac­ci­den­tal­ly dis­charged dur­ing prepa­ra­tions for Mon­day’s In­de­pen­dence Day dis­play at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah, re­mains in crit­i­cal con­di­tion at the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

Ac­cord­ing to re­ports, Jen­nifer Cz­erep­ka, 45, of Flori­da, was at­tach­ing an elec­tron­ic match to a fire­work mo­tor hous­ing when it ac­ci­den­tal­ly ig­nit­ed, caus­ing the fire­works to dis­charge and ex­plode.

Cz­erep­ka suf­fered third-de­gree burns to the full an­te­ri­or of her body and was rushed to the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal by a Fire Ser­vice am­bu­lance for treat­ment.

Com­ment­ing on the in­ci­dent, Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment deputy leader San­jiv Bood­hu said: “I ex­tend my best wish­es for a safe and com­plete re­cov­ery to Ms Jen­nifer Cz­erep­ka who was re­port­ed­ly very se­ri­ous­ly in­jured while at­tempt­ing to make ready, fire­works for In­de­pen­dence Day cel­e­bra­tions.”

Bood­hu al­so chas­tised the Gov­ern­ment over what he de­scribed as de­cep­tion sur­round­ing its promise to use silent fire­works for the In­de­pen­dence cel­e­bra­tions.