Congo: truck fire kills 50 dead and 100 burned

KINSHASA, Congo – At least 50 people were killed early Saturday and more than 100 were badly burned when a tanker truck in the Congo collided with another truck. The villagers rushed to fetch the fuel that escaped and caught fire, witnesses and officials said.

"We deplore the deaths," Atu Matubuana, acting governor of Kongo Center, told the Associated Press. Officials were identifying charred bodies for burial, Matubuana said.

Faced with one of the country's deadliest road accidents, President Joseph Kabila ordered three days of national mourning "at this time particularly painful for the Congolese people".

The accident occurred in the night in the village of Mbuba, not far from the city of Kisantu and about 200 km southwest of the capital Kinshasa. The city lies on the main highway between the capital and the port of Matadi.

The fire quickly spread to nearby homes, the Congolese Ministry of Health said in a statement. An investigation was underway on the cause of the accident.

A photo tweeted by the department showed the blackened tanker, its torn front bumper and its missing windshield.

"The driver of the tanker vanished and the driver of the semi-trailer died on the scene," the ministry said. Twenty charred bodies were found and four others died after their arrival at the hospital.

"The balance sheet continues to evolve," the statement said.

The photos posted by a local journalist showed wounded, raw skin burns, crammed into the back of a pickup truck and stuck between two bikers while they were looking for l '. help.

"See under what conditions they are transported," said militant group LUCHA, known in English as Fight for Change, in a message posted on Twitter. "You can guess under what conditions they will be" treated. "Ashamed and turning in the 21st century!"

Upon the arrival of the country's health and transport ministers, ambulances and mobile clinics were dispatched to the scene.

The UN peacekeeping mission in Congo announced that it had offered assistance to the injured, with nine ambulances en route to assist with medical evacuations.

The Congolese army sent others, announced the Ministry of Health. Already 20 wounded had been evacuated to the capital, he added.

Road fatalities are common in Congo, where roads and other infrastructure in the vast country are often poorly maintained.

In 2010, more than 200 people were killed when a tanker truck overturned and burned in South Kivu province, on the other side of the country.

Again, many victims had tried to recover the fuel that was flowing when it caught fire.