A TRAGEDY PREMONISHED
A journalist instinct led to a ghastly sight of burnt bodies
Thursday morning Botswana Guardian team embarked on a journey to Gantsi, as usual leaving the city by six o clock in the morning as this is the best time to start a 600km road trip, especially on the Trans Kalahari road.
This time around the journey had reflected a bad omen.
From the preparations at the office on the previous day, one could tell the journey would be full of complications and unpleasant happenings. The assigned reporter was from a four days sick leave prior to the day of the trip and understandably, there was uncertainties on her health condition, especially on a long trip like this. However, she decided to travel as she had already recovered from a short illness, or so she thought.
The journey seemed okay until after Kang. About 150km after Kang we suddenly felt high temperatures, anyways; this was less of the concerns because we were still worried about accommodation in Gantsi. The time was around 11am, we thought it was normal for the temperatures to go high but the reporter who had just acquired knowledge on climate change issues and natural resources conservation was suspicions about the unusual look of the atmosphere, the sunlight appeared to be covered by an invisible cloud. “This atmosphere seems like it is winter, you know that sunlight in winter is a bit pale dull compared to summer season. There is a bit difference here maybe its cloudy in Gantsi,” said my colleague. I raised my eyes upfront and noticed a cloudy image in the sky. “Oh it’s cloudy in front, see.” I told my colleague.
After driving for about 30 minutes, we noticed that the cloud images were strange. It looked like it was raining from a distance but the smell in the atmosphere was like burnt grass. However my colleague tried to explain that it was because the veld had burnt before as we could notice black ashes from the sides of the road, seemingly burnt a few weeks earlier. Getting closer we saw a thick dark smoke ascending up the sky. We could tell there was a big fire upfront; we were not worried because it seemed to be far away from the road and therefore did not concentrate on the road curves. Coming very close we were in direct encounter with high flames of fire burning the thick dry savanna vegetation on both sides of the road. Trees were burning down and sparks were flying high jumping from one side of the road to the other. The reporter already thinking of the story about dangers of veld fire, she told the colleague to stop and take a photo but he hesitated until we were in the deep center of the smoke, the road was not visible anymore, it was a horrific situation one could faint due to the suffocation and heat from the flames of fire. We had no alternative but to just proceed slowly between the flames, the opposite lane was full of death risk as the fuel tank trucks were moving slowly between the raging fire, visibility was just on the 5m range. It was only by God’s grace one could make it through this situation. We had strong faith to pass and we finally made it.
Upon return, the following day, we were less concerned about yesterday’s situation, little did we know of a great tragedy ahead. After about 250 km from Gantsi we saw the same smoke ascending to the cloud like yesterday, That fire is still burning.
We just thought it was like yesterday condition. When we got closer we realized a tragedy had happened. That was a sorrowful situation, I witnessed five trucks on flames, huge fire burning so high, 39 000 liters of diesel burning from the road side, the wind was filled with rattling sound of beer bottles exploding due to heat as the truck was on fire. Immediately I alighted from the car and moved closer to the fire fighters, moving to the other side where they had extinguished the fire. The inquisitive mind of the journalist was to locate the truck drivers and hear what happened. A bad idea it was! I came into direct contact with the remains of burnt bodies. A very sad sight. Only the skull and some bones were visible from the other truck, the other was only the ash in the center and was beyond recognition. There were three survivors and they told me that one truck driver was stuck in the middle of the fire and the three of them piled on him.