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A large number of motorists were held up on Wednesday in a 15-hour gridlock, caused by a multiple accident on the Kara Bridge, Ogun State end of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.
While the motorists could not abandon their vehicles, many commuters, however, resorted to trekking from Berger to the OPIC end of the expressway, where the gridlock eased.
It was also observed that from the scene of the incident in Ogun State, the traffic stretched to the Ogudu and Ikeja areas of Lagos State.
The gridlock was compounded by another tanker loaded with fuel which fell on the Otedola Bridge, Berger, Lagos, and spilled its content.
While three persons died in the Kara Bridge accident, two occupants of the tanker on Otedola Bridge sustained varying degrees of injuries.
PUNCH Metro learnt that the accident at Kara occurred around 2.30am after the driver of a tanker loaded with diesel lost control of the vehicle and rammed into a truck conveying crates of beer.
A few minutes later, another truck brushed the side of a Toyota Corolla and ran into the tanker and the truck. The impact ignited the fire.
As the fire raged, another truck carrying bags of flour rammed into the burning vehicles. The truck and the flour were partially consumed by the raging fire.
It was gathered that six vehicles – three trucks, two trailers, and one Toyota Corolla – were involved in the crash, which resulted in a fire outbreak. The inferno reportedly raged for about an hour before it was put out by men of the Lagos State Fire Service.
However, the flour was still smoldering as of 10am when one of our correspondents visited the scene.
No fewer than three persons were burnt to death, while five of the vehicles were razed, bringing traffic to a standstill. One of the trailers had KTU 396 XK as its number plate.
The corpses of the victims were said to have been deposited in a morgue.
The owner of the burnt Toyota Corolla, Kehinde Ibrahim, told one of our correspondents that he was returning home from work when the incident happened.
He said,
“I was coming from the office in Lagos, going towards Mowe in Ogun State. It was around 2am. When I got to Berger, the traffic started building up. At a point, it stopped moving. It eased a bit and I got to Kara. A truck coming from the rear brushed my vehicle by the side and rammed into the tanker, starting the fire.“I couldn’t see anything as the fire was everywhere. I still don’t know how I escaped. I started running until I got to the OPIC area; I didn’t look back. It was after the fire subsided that I came back to see what had become of my car. It had been razed.”
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