Boys’ team killed in Molo oil blaze

• Families report 36 children missing to the Red Cross

Sixteen boys playing football were among the villagers burned to death in the Molo oil fire.

In all 36 children aged between six and 17 reported missing to the Kenya Red Cross by their families. They are feared dead.

The 16 were among 26 children playing near the place where a tanker overturned, attracting a crowd of looters on Saturday night.

By Monday, the death toll from the tanker explosion had climbed to 115 with tens others still in hospital being treated for serious burns.

The children were playing at an open field at Sachang’wan, near Salgaa on the Eldoret-Nakuru road when a tanker overturned, spilling fuel.

Hundreds of villagers scrambled to collect the spilt fuel.

The boys were attracted by the commotion and went to see what was happening, witnesses said, and then the tanker blew up. Ten are being treated at the Rift Valley Provincial General Hospital and four were flown to Nairobi for specialised treatment.

Of the 26, six are girls and the rest are boys.

Gloom hung over Kapsorok primary school in Sachang’wan where teachers reported one child was unaccounted for and nine were undergoing treatment in various hospitals.

The missing children underline the vastness of the tragedy in which motor cycle taxi drivers, farmers, internally displaced people and police officers were killed.

Harrison Koskei, a Standard Eight pupil at Kapsoro primary school in Molo, said they were playing football when they heard a loud bang.

Speaking from his hospital bed in Nakuru, he said they all ran towards the noise, out of curiosity.

He remembered being with his younger sister, who is in Standard Seven in the same school, as they ran toward the overturned tanker.

She was flown to Nairobi for treatment.

He said they watched the crowd scramble for fuel from a distance. But some of his friends went even closer. After the explosion, he woke up in hospital, his friends missing.

“I don’t know what happened, I only remember seeing an overturned tanker and people had gathered around it scooping fuel,” he said.

Others at the Rift Valley Provincial Hospital are Alex Kipkoech, 13, Wesley Kibet, 10, Nicholas Kipchirchir, 13, among others.
They are suffering from various degrees of burns. Some of them are in stable condition.

The children are receiving counselling to help them recover.

A counsellor, Ms Jane Jelagat from Kabarak University, one of 36 working with the patients, described this as the worst tragedy she has ever had to deal with.

“This is the worst I have seen in my career, they are in a bad condition but we are working hard to help them recover,” she said.

The trauma is worse for some, she said, because they were also affected by the post-election violence.

John Kigaru, 10, a Standard Six pupil at Kampla Primary School in Molo, said he was at the scene with his 13 year-old sister who is still missing.

“I don’t know where she is. I hope she is fine,” he said.

In a ward where six children are receiving treatment, distraught family members, relatives and other villages held hands in desperate prayer.

Many wept openly, overwhelmed by pity over the children’s suffering.

“Whatever we have done wrong, God, we seek forgiveness… there are many innocent children in pain. Heal them, ease their pain,” a woman in the room prayed, tears flowing down her face.