(7 Nov 2000) Natural Sound
XFA
A truck transporting petrol slammed into a line of parked vehicles in southwestern Nigeria and exploded into flames, killing at least 96 people.
"I have never in my life seen an accident like this," Osun state Governor Bisi Akande said on Monday at the scene of the explosion.
Local journalists reported that 96 bodies were recovered from the scene of Saturday's crash.
More than 50 people were treated for serious burns at two hospitals.
Witnesses and police said the truck's brakes failed on Saturday as it approached a line of cars passing through a police checkpoint ahead of a toll bridge on a highway linking the southwestern towns of Ife and Ibadan.
The truck slammed into the cars and spilled fuel, which ignited on impact.
Akande visited the Seventh Day Adventist Hospital, where he met with some of the victims and family members who had come to identify the dead.
The blaze, which engulfed everything within a 500-metre (500-yard) radius, destroyed at least 15 cars.
The dead included several street vendors.
Accidents involving fuel trucks are common in this West African country, where roads are poor and many vehicle owners circumvent the required road-worthiness inspections.
SOUNDBITE: (English)
Yes some cars are coming from Lagos, from wedding and they are going to Ife. Both the husband, the wife, the flower girls, the flower boys - all of them, they are perished. Only one man survived in the second Mercedes, only the husband survived - the wife, the children, all of them perished. I tell you you can see the human being flesh in the gutter so while we are talking of this thing the police people they came, they say they are trying, they are the friend of the people. They are our enemy, not our friend, they are our enemy.
SUPER CAPTION: Tokunbo Akinsolire, eye witness
SOUNDBITE: (English)
"We mobilised all the staff of the hospital, approximately 80 people to care for these victims. We set up a special burn unit to care for them. Currently two of the victims have died, fourteen were brought to the hospital. One of the victims was in what we'd call a mild burn but the other thirteen were serious. As I mentioned two have died, two have been transferred and the rest are still in critical condition."
SUPER CAPTION: Dr Martin Singer, medical director of Seven Day Eventist hospital
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