A Close Shave With Fueled Death [With Photos]

Chronicled by Afronuts @ Wednesday, November 14, 2012

I had just left my office at about 12.30pm today to meet with wifey at the end of the street leading to my office when I heard a loud smashing metal noise coming from the nearby road that descended from the bridge. I saw what looked like trailers cavorting on the road, took wifey and bolted away from the location.

A trailer carrying cement was trying to overtake another which was a fuel tanker for Total petroleum. In the process, the cement trailer brushed against the fuel tanker causing the cylinder tanker to burst open spilling out fuel all over the place.
The location was between Anthony Oke along Gbagada expressway and Ikorodu expressway.

There was instant panic as cars fled from the scenario. The hold-up that had kept them at a standstill suddenly cleared miraculously. One guy actually took his bag and fled his car. He eventually went back to take his car when the chaos died down a bit.

The Petrol Tanker Trailer

The building in the background is Greensprings School

To one side of the fuel tanker was Greensprings School, to the other side was Corona School, both high brow schools attended by children of well to do Nigerians. Corona was still safe from the spilling fuel but Greensprings was not. The fuel rushed and flowed towards their compound. The location of the school has always been debated as being a bad location for a school; it sat in the axis between Ikorodu expressway and Gbagada expressway.

Greenspring Students evacuated to a safer location

Buses from Greenspring evacuating nursery pupils 

Greensprings students with staff from the school

Students and pupils were immediately evacuated from Greensprings to a safer location. But that did not mean they were all out of harms way. A student who was asthmatic suddenly began to react to the strong smell of petrol and had to be attended to as an emergency. The smell of fumes was so strong that peoples eyes watered, skins smarted from the gas emitting from the petrol.

Excess Petrol flowing in the gutter

People rushing to fetch petrol from the gutter in the distance.

Wasted fuel rushed so much that it flowed through the gutters near our office before emptying into a canal in a nearby bush. Company drivers, security men and a host of other neighborhood individuals seized the opportunity to get buckets and kegs to fetch fuel from the gutters.

I watched in stupefaction. This people still haven't learnt from all the fuel scooping disasters reported in the past in the media; the most recent the one of 20 people who were burnt to death in Abia State along Aba/Ikot Ekpene highway.

The fire service department finally showed up and poured foam all over the road to contain the spilling fuel. The road was blocked and re-routed for safety. Then they flushed the gutters to rid the fuel flowing through all the way into the canal.

The fire service surprisingly took control of the situation and did well.

By the time I sat down back at my desk, I felt heavy in the head and slightly sickly due to the fumes. The smell had been so thick in the air we all felt the effect.

I can't imagine how many houses, lives and property would have been lost if someone had been careless to do something that would ignite an inferno.

Thank God another disaster was averted.