| credits: HotExclusive.com
No fewer than six people, including a middle-aged driver, died on Saturday in Edo and Kebbi states when two tankers laden with petrol crashed and exploded.
The crashes also left no fewer than 16 people seriously wounded and about 12 houses razed by the inferno.
The Edo crash, which killed the driver of the tanker, occurred when his vehicle exploded after colliding with a tow truck on Benin-Ore road, in Ovia South-West Local Government Area of the state.
The driver was said to have been blown to bits by the explosion. The driver of the tow truck was also injured.
The Kebbi crash, according to the News Agency of Nigeria, took place at Dabi while the tanker was heading to Mahuta in Kebbi.
The driver had lost control of the vehicle on the hilly Dabai junction, resulting in the fall of the vehicle and subsequent explosion.
The accident also left 12 houses and some vehicles parked by the roadside destroyed by inferno.
The Dabai-Suru and Dabai- Mahuta roads junction also serve as a market for fruits.
The Deputy Governor of Kebbi, who hails from Dabai, Mr. Samaila Yombe, was among early visitors to the scene of the accident.
Yombe condoled with relatives of the victims; the Emir of Zuru, Alhaji Sani Sami; the Chairman of Zuru Local Government Area, Mr. Ibrahim Rumu.
He pledged to offset the medical bills of those hospitalised.
The deputy governor said the State Emergency Management Agency had been directed to provide prompt relief material those who lost shops, household property, livestock and food crops to the inferno.
Nine other persons were injured in a separate auto crash involving a bus marked SGD502XA and a trailer with registration number NLC66FCT around Ekiadolor junction on the same road, about four hours after the tanker explosion.
It was gathered that tragedy struck at about 8.52am when the driver lost control of the tanker along Ovia River and rammed it into a Federal Road Safety Corps tow truck and two other vehicles being towed from an earlier accident scene.
It was learnt that the tanker, with registration number AO1607RS, went up in flames a few seconds after the collision.
As of the time of filing the report, the state Sector Commander of the FRSC, Mr. Oluwasusi Familoni, who confirmed the accident, said officers of the corps were still at the location of the incident to evacuate the remains of the deceased and other debris from the scene.
He said those critically injured had been taken to Providence Hospital, Iguosa, for treatment.
The sector commander also noted that two other vehicles, including the tow truck valued at about 100 million naira and donated by the World Bank in 2014, were affected by the inferno.
Familoni said, “A tanker loaded with PMS ran into the FRSC tow truck while it was evacuating two vehicles involved in an auto crash along the Ovia River slope on the Benin-Ore road.
“The tanker driver was burnt to death while the driver of the tow truck sustained injuries. There was no casualty recorded in the auto crash involving the two vehicles that were being towed by the tow truck.”
Punch
EmoticonEmoticon