One Person Severely Injured In Benue Gas Explosion

One person has been severely injured in a gas explosion while cooking at the hostel of the School of Nursing and Midwifery, Makurdi.

A witness said the victim, Stella Verkya, was cooking in the hostel after returning from a lecture when the explosion occurred.

Narrating how the incident happened, one of the students said: “At about 1:35 PM, we were in the hostel when we heard the sound of an explosion from a gas cooker from which our colleague Stella Verkya was cook with. The fire engulfed her and we ran out of the hostel to call our principal who in turn call the fire service”.

Inspecting the scene of the explosion, Benue State Acting Governor Benson Abounu direct the school management to stop the practice of cooking within the hostel.

Mr Abounu who offered to pay for the victim’s treatment said: “The Commissioner of Health should meet with the principal officers of the school and the principal officers of the Ministry of Health to put heads together and work out a solution that is accepted as best practice to this problem”.

“What we have seen today is totally unacceptable. Where a student has to cook inside where she sleeps is totally unacceptable even for the health of the student herself not to talk about this fire hazard we have seen,” he added.

Speaking to reporters, the school principal, Victoria Gusa, gave an update on the condition of the victims, saying: “Yes, it is severe and the burnt covered some much percentage of her body”.

“She has been transferred to the Intensive Care Unit but her mother could not afford the cost, at the moment she is still at the Accident and Emergency Unit. Her head up to the umbilical region and her leg, so the whole of the upper extremity is burnt,” she added.