ABUJA, Nigeria
A fuel tanker collided head-on with another truck in Nigeria on Sunday causing an explosion that killed at least 48 people, the country’s emergency response agency said.
The fuel tanker was also
carrying cattle in the Agaie area in north-central Niger state and at least 50
of them were burned alive, Abdullahi Baba-Arab, director-general of the Niger
State Emergency Management Agency, said.
Search and rescue operations
were underway at the scene of the accident, Baba-Arab said.
Baba-Arab said initially that
30 bodies were found but in a later statement said an additional 18 bodies of
victims who were burned to death in the collision were found. He said the dead
had been given a mass burial.
Mohammed Bago, governor of
Niger state, said residents of the affected area should remain calm and asked
road users to “always be cautious and abide by road traffic regulations to
safeguard lives and property.”
With the absence of an
efficient railway system to transport cargo, fatal truck accidents are common
along most of the major roads in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country.
In 2020 alone, there were
1,531 gasoline tanker crashes resulting in 535 fatalities and 1,142 injuries,
according to Nigeria’s Federal Road Safety Corps.
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