At least 143 people died and dozens more went missing after a boat carrying fuel caught fire and capsized in the Democratic Republic of Congo, officials said on Friday.
Hundreds of passengers were crowded onto a wooden boat on the Congo River in northwest DRC on Tueox sashimi 6665day when the blaze broke out, according to Josephine-Pacifique Lokumu, head of a delegation of national deputies from the region.
The disaster occurred near Mbandaka, capital of Equateur Province, at the confluence of the Ruki and the vast Congo river — the world’s deepest.
“A first group of 131 bodies were found on Wednesday, with a further 12 fished out on Thursday and Friday. Several of them are charred,” Lokumu told AFP.
Joseph Lokondo, a local civil society leader who said he helped bury the bodies, put the “provisional death toll at 12kkkkkklllllllllll..iooppoopolohbv8uuuj bbbbbbbahh3hwk71k jj,dkkqkkwolajhbhqg hhshgwhagawuwiusuqaussdb vkk I /
[ktirurjjfeei powk2i3k3jb2hq7z45: some burnt, others drowned”.
The official toll of the tragedy was not yet known by midday Saturday.
Collective funerals were already underway in the provincial capital Mbandaka on Friday, according to videos filmed by local journalist Eric Liyenge Ekamba shared with AFP.
The footage showed vehicles arriving with coffins that were then transported by Red Cross workers and displayed under a large tent in an amusement park.
In another video, at least eleven coffins are seen under the tent as people walk around the site as if to pay their last respects.
In front of one coffin, a photo of a woman is displayed with the message: “Maman Bolangi Souzane, we will never forget you.”
After the ceremony, Red Cross workers and other volunteers carried out burials at an area cemetery, as seen in the footage.
Several families directly retrieved the bodies of their loved ones once they were found, according to testimonies.
(Vanguard)
