Gas plant explosion in Anambra kills two

Two persons were reportedly burnt to death and two others sustained injuries when a gas plant exploded at Nkwelle-Ezunka in Oyi local council of Anambra State.

Two houses close to the gas plant, including personal belongings of the tenants, were also burnt to ashes. The two victims who died in the inferno were the driver of the tanker that brought the gas and another young man, Ezenwoke Nwigwe, who hailed from Ikeala Ngwa in Abia State. He recently completed his National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) programme in Ibadan, Oyo State and was residing with his sister in the area.

An eyewitness said the fire disaster occurred when a tanker loaded with gas was being discharged at the station. A security man at the gas station, Mr. Harrison Alphonsus, from Adamawa State and the manager of the station, Mr. Tony Nwokonko, said the explosion caught one of the victims (Nwigwe) as he applied the fire extinguisher to quench the fire, only to be consumed by the fire.

According to them, the victims were rushed to the Orthopedic Hospital, Enugu where they were confirmed dead, while the injured ones are currently receiving treatment at an undisclosed hospital.

The landlord of the burnt houses, Chief Nnamdi Okafor, said he would have lost his entire family to the fire, but for God’s intervention. He, however, praised the men from the Okpoko Fire Service in Onitsha, who brought the situation under control, adding, however, that the fire destroyed everything he had before help came.

“The fire incident has crippled me. Everything I have has been lost, but what pains me most is the loss of my two tenants”, he said. It would be recalled that a devastating gas explosion that occurred at Chikason Group of Industries on Christmas Eve in 2015, claimed about 100 lives in the Nnewi industrial town of Anambra State.

Some of the casualties, including workers, customers and some residents of areas around the industrial site were severely to death when a truck was making an attempt to discharge its contents without waiting for the mandatory cooling time while customers were said to be refilling at the same time.

All the people who went to the gas plant to get a refill ahead of the Yuletide celebrations were burnt to ashes while some of the victims who were in the neighborhood and passers-by also got caught in the inferno.