Lagos: The death toll from the explosion of a petrol tanker truck in Nigeria that killed people rushing to gather fuel has risen to 86, emergency services said Sunday.
The truck carrying 60,000 litres (nearly 16,000 gallons) of gasoline exploded after flipping over on a road in the centre of the country on Saturday, authorities said.
"The final death toll from the tanker explosion is 86," said Ibrahim Audu Husseini, spokesman for the Niger state's emergency management agency.
"We buried 86 burnt corpses between 12:00 pm yesterday to 2:00 am of today," he said, updating an earlier toll of 70.
"It took us 14 hours to bury the bodies because we couldn't get excavators and had to get locals to dig the mass grave manually."
He said 52 other people suffered "severe burns from the explosion".
The blast struck at the Dikko junction on the road linking the federal capital Abuja to the northern city of Kaduna.
A crowd of people rushed to the spot where the tanker had turned over in search of fuel, whose price has soared in an economic crisis.
After taking power in 2023, President Bola Tinubu abolished a fuel subsidy, driving up food and transport costs.
Tinubu expressed "deep sorrow over the fuel tanker explosion", a statement from his office said Sunday.
"He underscored the tragic and preventable nature of the incident."
He ordered a national campaign to "raise public awareness about the severe risks and environmental dangers of scooping fuel from fallen tankers".
In October, more than 170 people died in a similar accident in Jigawa State, in northern Nigeria.
In 2020, the Federal Road Safety Corps listed 1,531 fuel tanker accidents which claimed over 535 lives.
