Employees escape death as bus catches fire in gridlock

There was pandemonium at the Ox Bow Lake Road junction, Yenagoa in Bayelsa State, after a bus went up in flames in a traffic jam on Wednesday.

Our correspondent who was at the scene of the incident observed that the thick ball of flame that emanated from the Mitsubishi L300 bus forced motorists to flee the area.

The scene immediately attracted onlookers and sympathisers, who initially mistook the vehicle for a passenger bus.

But two persons, a driver and a passenger, struggled out of the bus unhurt.

They were, however, concerned about the bus and its content.

The apprehensive young men remained speechless for sometimes.

The driver, who was obviously confused, shed tears as he asked his colleague that he identified as Uche to call their boss.

“I am finished. What will I tell my boss?” he queried himself.

The driver also refused to keep his distance from the burning bus, forcing sympathisers to drag him out of the area. They advised him to calm down and thank God for his life.

While Uche was faltering on a telephone with the owner of the bus, identified as Akpomedaye, one of the sympathisers grabbed the handset and told the woman that her bus was on fire.

The sympathiser, who identified himself simply as Sunday, said the woman took the incident in her stride and urged the weeping driver to be calm.

Uche later explained that the bus was used to supply drink to customers.

On how the incident occurred, he said, “We were in the bus and all heard a little explosion under the bus. We saw smoke and immediately fire came out but we managed to escape.”

The snarl on the road before the fire incident also cleared as panic-stricken motorists behind the ill-fated bus were seen doing a U-turn to escape the fire.