Dozens killed in Nigerian truck fire as they lined up for gas refills in time for Christmas

Gas tank bursts into flames at an industrial plant in southeast Nigeria

Dozens of Nigerians queuing to fill their gas bottles for Christmas were killed when a huge explosion ripped through the gas plant, sparking a blaze that lasted over five hours.

The explosion happened on Christmas Eve, when a truck was discharging butane gas at the facility in Nnewi town in Anambra state, and a crowd of customers refilled gas bottles.

President Muhammadu Buhari’s office said “tens of people” who had been looking forward to their Christmas celebrations had been killed, without giving a precise toll.

One local journalist at the scene, David Onwuchekwa, said: “I saw around 100 charred corpses.” But Ali Okechukwu, police spokesman, put the death toll much lower, and said on Friday that six bodies had been recovered.

Most of the casualties were motorcyclists and passersby who went to look at the fire, before the explosion happened.

“My heart and prayers go out to these grieving families at this difficult and painful moment,” said Mr Buhari.
Carl Ofuonye, another local journalist, said the blast had been sparked when the truck exploded while discharging gas.

“So many people were in the building, workers at the plant, people who came to buy gas,” he said. “A woman and a child in a nearby building died.”

“The fire burned beyond recognition all the workers who were inside that depot at that time and also all the customers inside that depot,” said Chukwuemerie Uduchukwu, who went to the scene.
Many others were being treated for burns at nearby hospitals.

“I saw flames but I didn’t know what was going on and started running and then I heard an explosion,” the wife of the manager of a nearby construction site told local TV station Television Continental.
“Even while running the fire burnt me all over.”