Posted by By Emma Una/Calabar on
All efforts by men of the Calabar Fire Service to put out a burning Arab Contractor truck could not save the vehicle. It ended up a smoking pile.
All efforts by men of the Calabar Fire Service to put out a burning Arab Contractor truck could not save the vehicle. It ended up a smoking pile.
The truck, with registration number XB 528 AAA, was racing down the IBB Way, early on Monday morning, when its brakes failed. Even with its horn blaring, the driver could not clear a path for it as it rammed into a commercial motorcycle (Okada) with registration number QC 342 KMM, at the IBB Way, near Akim Market junction.
The Okada rider and his female passenger were seriously injured in the accident. The rider's right leg was severed while the lady's right arm was also cut off by the truck's tyres. The wailing of the female passenger and the Okada rider attracted a crowd of angry young men who set the truck ablaze with fuel from the damaged motorcycle.
'I arrived here a few seconds after the truck was set ablaze by the youths and I used four fire extinguishers to try to put out the flames but when the fire became serious, I had to call the fire service,' Tony Kawaja, a Lebanese resident in Calabar, told P.M.News, at the scene of the accident.
The police traffic warden who was controlling traffic at the scene of the accident said the crowd became uncontrollable when they saw blood gushing out of the woman's severed hand.
'I had to report the matter at the police station because there was nothing I could do to dissuade the mob from burning down the truck,' he told the police inspector who led a police team to the scene of the accident. Calabar residents have in the past few weeks become restive following acts of lawlessness in the city by secret cult groups.