* Vehicles, tricycles also burnt
Several persons were reported killed on Friday following an explosion at an illegal crude oil bunkering site in Rumuekpe community, Emuoha Local Government Area of Rivers State.
Reports said the victims are mostly indigenes of the community, who had gone to the tapping point of the Trans Niger Delta Pipeline (TNP), which passes through the general area.
Reports further said the blast occurred around 2am on Friday.
A group – the Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre (YEAC-Nigeria) – through its Crude Oil Spill Alert System (COSAS), said an initial fire outbreak from a bus conveying the crude oil to a refining site led to the explosion.
The Executive director of YEAC, Fyneface Dunamene Fyneface, added that some of the victims included women and men who “were burnt beyond recognition with several other vehicles and tricycles burnt to ashes at the tapping point said to be on the Trans Niger Delta Pipeline (TNP) that passed through the community.”
Fyneface, who campaigns against crude oil theft, and environmental pollution and advocates for modular refining, added that some parked buses that had also loaded crude oil and were about to move got consumed by the explosion.