206 killed by blasts at Congo arms depot

BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo — Homes and buildings collapsed in the Congolese capital after an arms depot exploded Sunday, killing at least 206 people and entombing others under crushed structures, including two churches that buckled while parishioners were celebrating Mass, officials and witnesses said.

The shock waves shattered windows in a three - mile radius surrounding the barracks storing the munitions, including across the river that separates Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, from Kinshasa, the capital of the larger Central African nation of Congo.

Government spokesman Bienvenu Okyemi blamed a short- circuit for the fire that set off the successive blasts.

“It’s like a tsunami passed through here,” said Christine Ibata, a student. “The roofs of houses were blown off.”

Some 1,500 people were injured, Okyemi said on national radio.

The register of a morgue in Brazzaville already had 136 bodies Sunday afternoon, and more continued to arrive. A doctor at the capital’s military hospital who asked not to be named reported 70 more deaths.

It’s unclear what started the fire at the barracks located in a populated neighborhood of the capital, but an official at the president’s office said the depot is used to store war-grade weapons, including mortars.

The explosions caused buildings to shake as far away as Kinshasa, separated from Brazzaville by the 3mile -wide Congo River.