Four People Burnt Beyond Recognition As Fuel Tanker Explodes On Ajaokuta Bridge

 

NOT less than four persons were burnt beyond

recognition yesterday when a fuel-laden tanker burst into

flames on the River Niger Bridge after Itobe in Ajakuta

Local Council of Kogi State.

It was gathered that the tanker driver and the conductor

had tampered with the fuel tanker at Itobe near

Ajaokuta, where they might have sold out some of the

fuel and, in the process, they could not properly cover

the valve which started gushing fuel onto the bridge.

About 14 members of the Kogi State Correspondent

chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) who were

returning from a party campaign rally in Olamaboro

Local Council escaped the fireball by whiskers.

The correspondents of Leadership and Vanguard

newspapers, Mr. Sam Egwu and Bolu Obahopo, however,

sustained various degrees of injury when they jumped

out from the moving vehicle that conveyed them.

The Guardian gathered that the driver of the 33,000 litres

capacity tanker made frantic efforts to stem the

outpouring of fuel from the side valves of the tanker,

before the sudden fire outburst that consumed them.

A motorcyclist, who was attempting to overtake the

Toyota Haice bus of the Correspondents Chapel slipped

over the fuel, fell down and the scratch of the silencer on

the bridge ignited the fire which consumed the fuel

tanker as well as the driver of the tanker.

The Toyota Haice bus, which had passed immediately

after, caught fire from the underside, during which a

stampede ensued inside the bus.

Others who later alighted were able to put out the fire

with the fire extinguisher, while those injured were taken

to the nearby Crestwood Hospital, Ajaokuta, for

treatment.