Death Toll In Gombe Petrol Tanker Explosion Rises To 16

The number of those killed in a petrol tanker explosion in Gombe State has risen to 16.

The Assistant Director of Nurses at the Federal Teaching Hospital, Gombe, Musa Gyade, confirmed this to Channels Television on Sunday.

Eleven people were initially confirmed dead with several others injured on Saturday after the tanker exploded along the Gombe-Biu bypass.

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The tanker, said to be laden with petrol, was said to have had a brake failure and rammed into a truck loaded with bottled water, crushing two motorcycles and two tricycles in the process.

Giving an update on the incident, Gyade disclosed that 20 other victims sustained various degrees of burns.

He, however, said they were already receiving medical attention at both the Federal Teaching Hospital and the State Specialist Hospital in Gombe.

The assistant director explained that 23 people were brought to the hospital, out of which three of them died while being treated and two more deaths were later recorded.

Elsewhere, the Medical Director of the State Specialist Hospital, Dr Shu’aibu Mu’azu, told Channels Television that 11 bodies were brought to the hospital.

He added that four of them were recognised and handed over to their relatives, but no one has come to claim the remaining seven bodies as they were burnt beyond recognition.