Incident Report

Subject:        Nigeria - Lightning Sets Minna NNPC Depot on Fire           

Date of Email report:   Fri 01/11/2013

Report Detail:

Fire on Wednesday consumed the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) deport in Pogo area of Minna and destroyed one of the storage tanks at the depot before it was brought under control. Although the cause of the fire was not made public by the depot officials, our correspondent gathered that it may have resulted from the lightning and thunder bolts that struck the facility during a torrential rain at about 10pm on Wednesday. Eye witnesses said the inferno lasted for over four hours from 10 pm to 2am Thursday morning before it was put off by the joint efforts of the depot fire fighters and men of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps. It was learnt that the tank that was struck by lightning had its thunder/lighting Arrestor - a vital safety device to prevent lightning strikes, stolen a few months ago.

Two of the thunder/lightening arrestors were said to have been stolen from the deport in February forcing the management in a memo to the security firm handling the facility to ban staffers of a contract company from entering the facility    An eye witness further  said that as soon as the lightning struck, the tank caught fire and went up in flames and that the alarm by some staff on night duty attracted people around including fuel tanker drivers who mobilised to curtail the fire and prevented it from spreading to other tanks at the deport. Some of the fuel tanker drivers were said to have panicked and ran away with their trucks from the depot in the pandemonium

The lack of water at the deport was said to have presented a challenge to the fire fighters as three of the boreholes in the deport were said to have dried up, forcing the fire fighters seek help from colleagues at the Suleja deport of the Corporation for supply of water. Though no life was lost, the extent of damage was said to be minimal due to non-availability of petroleum products at the storage tanks. Efforts to get the reaction of the Deport Manager, Mr. N Loveday proved abortive as he said he was not competent to speak on the fire incident. When pressed he simply said: "I am expecting my superiors from Abuja and Kaduna. I am not competent to speak on the incident. Everything is under control now and workers are at their duty posts."

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