Onitsha Fire: Woman Who Died with Baby Was Childless for 16 Years, Says Neighbour ...As Death Toll Rises to Five

 

The woman who was reported to have been the only victim in last Wednesday's fire incident involving a petrol tanker in Onitsha, Anambra State, alongside her infant child, was said to have been childless for 16 years, until early this year when she had the baby.

It was gathered from a victim of the fire, Chukwuka Okeke, who claimed to be her neighbour, that the woman's husband was also a trader in the city of Onitsha.

Okeke gave an account of how the woman fell victim to the fire, saying she had initially escaped the fire with her baby, but slipped into the gutter and was consumed.

According to him, "The woman had already rushed out of the shop with her baby but she suddenly went back.  She slipped off in the process and fell inside the gutter which was already in flames.

 

"We were in our shops when I got the call that there was fire at Upper Iweka. Though we saw smoke from a distance, nobody could believe it would extend to this place.

"For over three hours, we were perceived the smell of petrol probably mixed with gas from a distance as it flowed through the drainage system until the whole area went up in flames.”

 

Okeke said the woman, whose husband also owns a shop in the city, just had the baby early this year after 16years of marriage.

Meanwhile, three more dead bodies of traders in the market were on Thursday recovered from shops that were gutted by the fire.

Traders who constituted themselves into rescue groups discovered the dead bodies in shops at the Ochanja market.

 

One of the rescuers, who spoke with journalists on condition of anonymity, said he suspected that two of the bodies being girls were trapped when others ran away from the fire last Wednesday.

He added that another body of a man was recovered at another shop.

The witness said: "We also recovered the body of a young man in one shop. His body was not touched by the fire. We suspected he must have died of suffocation. The bodies of two salesgirls were also discovered in a shop."