SANGE, Congo – Dozens of moaning and badly burned survivors from a massive tanker blast that killed at least 230 people recovered in hospitals and clinics across eastern Congo on Sunday, two days after the wrecked fuel truck exploded on a rural highway.

President Joseph Kabila declared a two-day national mourning period, and Red Cross workers sprayed chlorine and poured disinfectant powder over the blackened scene of the explosions in the village of Sange, where priests prayed during a brief memorial service on a barren football field.

In a conflict-strewn corner of one of the world’s most unstable countries, the shocking tragedy late Friday in the village of Sange was a devastating blow for residents in a still lawless region who survived back-to-back back wars that lasted from 1996 to 2002.

“It’s a miserable, poor life we have here in Congo,” said Muke Ndengwa, whose 15-year-old son was nearly killed in the blast. “When we had the war here, we had everything stolen from us. Now we have lost so much again.”

Troubles began when the tanker hauling fuel from the provincial capital, Bukavu, overturned as it tried to pass a minibus in Sange, a small village near the Burundi border. Tipped on its side, the wrecked vehicle began gushing gasoline beside three flimsy television halls made of brick and wood, where hundreds of people had gathered to watch the World Cup.

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SANGE, Congo – A tanker truck hauling fuel on a rural eastern Congo highway overturned, gushing oil and exploding in a massive fireball that killed about 220 bystanders, including many who had been watching the World Cup in flimsy roadside shacks, officials and witnesses said Saturday.

The Red Cross said at least 61 children and 36 women were among the dead. Witnesses said dozens of people had descended on the truck to siphon fuel illegally from the wreckage with jerry-cans and plastic buckets, apparently unaware of the danger.

U.N. peacekeepers rushed to evacuate more than 200 wounded from the scene by helicopter and ambulance, while Red Cross teams carried the charred bodies from the scene in body bags and buried them in two mass graves a few miles (kilometers) away.

The truck overturned as it was trying to pass a minibus late Friday near the village of Sange, around 20 miles (30 kilometers) north of Uvira, a town on the northern tip of Lake Tanganyika near the Burundi border, said Mana Lungwe, manager of the Congolese oil company that owns the truck. The vehicle began gushing oil, then burst into flames an hour later.

Lungwe said the driver was injured in the accident and taken to a local clinic before the blast occurred. Sange is located between Uvira and the Congolese provincial capital, Bukavu, further to the north.

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KINSHASA, Congo – At least 204 people were killed in Congo when a tanker truck transporting oil flipped over and exploded overnight in the east of the country, a Red Cross official said Saturday.

The truck was carrying fuel from neighboring Tanzania when it overturned at high speed late Friday in the village of Sange, around 100 kilometers (60 miles) outside the regional capital, Bukavu, said Red Cross official Desire Yuma.

Speaking by telephone from Bukavu, Yuma said the toll could rise since Red Cross workers were still collecting bodies from the scene.

U.N.-funded Radio Okapi reported a similar death toll, and said some local residents had rushed to steal the leaking fuel when it burst into flames.

Madnodje Mounoubai, a spokesman for the U.N. mission that has peacekeepers in the region, said the U.N. force was investigating the blast. He said no U.N. troops were killed or wounded.

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KINSHASA (Reuters) –
More than 200 people were killed and 100 injured when a fuel tanker overturned and exploded in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo late on Friday, a local governor said on Saturday.

A spokesman for the United Nations mission in Congo said he was checking reports that some peacekeepers had been killed in the explosion as they tried to prevent people from approaching the overturned tanker.

“There was an accident when a truck overturned and petrol started coming out on all sides … More than 200 people have died so far and about a hundred are injured — seriously burned,” said Marcellin Cisambo, governor of South Kivu province where the accident took place.

“Some people were killed trying to steal the fuel, but most of the deaths were of people who were indoors watching the (World Cup) match,” Cisambo said.

The accident took place on the road between the provincial capital Bukavu and Uvira, a town to the south on the border with Burundi, Cisambo added.

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