Rxfire object not allowing firebase reference as a parameter

Good day, I'm trying to use rxfire to combine multiple Firebase data sources, The code below should stream a list of "cities" from Realtime database and then retrieves their image from a Cloud Storage bucket. I'm following through the official docs but using realtime database. Im getting an error while using rxfire object method

import database from '@react-native-firebase/database';import { object } from 'rxfire/database/';import { combineLatest, map, switchMap } from "rxjs"; --> imports section   export const fetchUserContacts = () => async (dispatch: (arg0: { type: any; payload: any;    }) => void) => {        const ref = database().ref("cities");        object(ref)  --> compilation error here         .pipe(         switchMap(cities => {           return combineLatest(...cities.map(c => {             const ref = ref(storage, `/cities/${c.id}.png`);            return getDownloadURL(ref).pipe(map(imageURL => ({ imageURL, ...c })));           }));         })       )       .subscribe(cities => {         cities.forEach(c => console.log(c.imageURL));       });  };

Compilation error that I'm getting

Argument of type 'Reference' is not assignable to parameter of type 'Query'.The types of 'ref.isEqual' are incompatible between these types.Type '(other: Query) => boolean' is not assignable to type '(other: Query | null) => boolean'.Types of parameters 'other' and 'other' are incompatible.Type 'Query | null' is not assignable to type 'Query'.Type 'null' is not assignable to type 'Query'.ts(2345)const ref: FirebaseDatabaseTypes.Reference