50 killed in Congo tanker fire

KINSHASA, Congo — At least 50 people were killed and more than 100 were badly burned when a tanker truck in Congo collided with another truck, and as villagers rushed to collect the leaking fuel, burst into flames, witnesses and officials said Saturday.

Faced with one of the country’s deadliest traffic accidents, President Joseph Kabila ordered three days of national mourning “in this particularly painful moment for the Congolese people.”

The accident occurred overnight in the village of Mbuba, not far from Kisantu city and about 200 kilometres southwest of the capital, Kinshasa.

The fire quickly spread to nearby homes, Congo’s health ministry said in a statement. An investigation was underway into the cause of the accident.

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

“The driver of the tanker truck has disappeared while the driver of the tractor trailer died at the scene,” the ministry said. Twenty charred bodies had been recovered, and four others died after arriving at a hospital.

“The toll continues to evolve,” the statement said.

The interim governor of Kongo-Central province, Atu Matubuana, who shared the toll of at least 50 dead, said officials were identifying bodies in preparation for burial.

Photos posted online by a local journalist showed some of the injured, their skin raw from burns, piled into the back of a pickup truck as they sought aid.

Ambulances and mobile clinics rushed to the scene.

The U.N. peacekeeping mission in Congo said it had offered assistance for the injured, with nine ambulances en route to help with medical evacuations.

Congo’s military was sending others, the health ministry said. Already 20 of the injured had been evacuated to the capital, it added.