A mysterious gas explosion which left one dead and an entire building of a gas refilling shop completely demolished, rocked the city of Kano, Thursday.
It was one incident which left residents of Sabon-gari area of Fagge Local Government Area in Kano State scampering for safety when the huge explosion and the accompanying noise sent panic through the city.
Though no official reason has been given as the possible cause of the devastating blast, eyewitness reports at the scene of the incident told Weekend Vanguard that the tragedy occurred at about 7 o’clock in the morning when the deceased, 28-year-old Anayo Ajegbu went into his shop to attend to some customers.
One of his relations who was in tears and would prefer anonymity for now, said that his late brother left unusually early for his shop that morning without taking his bath in order to attend to some customers who had earlier called at his residence. He would not know the whereabout of those two customers who, this paper learnt, were with the late Ajegbu at the time of the blast.
In tears, he managed to tell that he only saw “the pieces of my brother’s remains being gathered by the police at the scene of the incident.” Continuing, he said: “I have not seen the dead body of my brother. I only saw parts of his body being gathered by police officers who came to the scene of the incident. I don’t know what had happened to the people who were with him before the explosion. You can see that they are still searching for their corpses.”
Efforts to get the mother of late Anayo to speak proved difficult as she was not accessible, with sympathisers who had gathered at their residence to share in the grief of the bereaved family.
The special Bomb Disposal Unit who visited the venue of the explosion battled throughout the early hours of the day to retrieve some bodies that may have been buried under the rubble as they carried out their investigation to find out the remote and immediate cause(s) of the tragedy.
“We’re more concerned with rescuing some persons that may be trapped,” said one the policemen on duty. “We learnt that he was not alone. So, that’s why we’re desperately searching for any clue to the position of the others.”
At the time of filing the report, several Igbo traders and other residents continued to besiege the venue of the blast with the charred building showing every evidence of its devastation.
