Hundreds dead, thousands missing in munitions dump disaster

Hundreds of people died and thousands are believed to be missing after a fire at a munitions dump in Nigeria’s commercial capital set off massive explosions, residents and witnesses said on Monday. More than 300 bodies have been discovered in a canal in the Isolo suburb, adjoining the Ikeja Military Cantonment, to the north of Lagos. Residents said hundreds of panic-stricken people had fled the area on Sunday evening in the direction of the Oke-Ifa canal, as huge balls of fire exploding from the arms depot overwhelmed their neighbourhood. "Many people simply ran into the water to escape the fire and drowned as a result," Taiwo Akinbo, a member of a team of volunteers scouring the area for survivors, told IRIN. "We have counted over 300 dead already and there are still more." Privately-owned African Independent Television and Galaxy Television on their afternoon programme segments, featured shots showing scores of dead bodies recovered from the canal, most of them children and women. Rescue operations, meanwhile, continued with canoes provided by locals. Several houses in the military barracks and surrounding neighbourhoods collapsed, weakened by intense vibrations from the explosions or by heat from the fire. People are believed to be trapped in the rubble. Casualties also occurred when missiles from the munitions depot shot across the city over several kilometres, landing in some residential areas. In the worst-hit neighbourhoods of Ikeja, Oshodi, Mafoluku, Isolo and Ejigbo, thousands of people were milling about on Monday in search of missing relatives and thousands more are believed to be still unaccounted for. "There are more than 3,000 people in Ijegun, mainly children," a middle-aged man said on Galaxy Television. "They are there in the compound of the village head. We saw thousands of them just running without direction and we directed them to come and stay with us. So anybody whose children are missing should go there and check." Red Cross officials confirmed that the unfolding scope of the disaster was beyond what they had anticipated. "We can’t give any figures of dead, wounded or displaced people for now, but we know there are so many," one official told IRIN. "We are for now concentrating on providing emergency assistance with the aim of saving as many lives as possible." Many people who called on radio phone-in programmes and spoke on television bemoaned the lack of official emergency response and assistance. Most of the residents of the Oke-Ifa canal area lamented that no government official had visited the area to see the extent of the disaster. "They said on television the impact was restricted to the cantonment and that no lives were lost, let them come here and see dead bodies," one woman said.