Dozens dead in Mexico truck explosion

Reuters

MEXICAN BLAST: A truck carrying fertilizer has exploded in Mexico, killing dozens and wounding more than one hundred, including rescue workers.

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A truck loaded with chemical fertilizer has exploded in Mexico after a traffic accident, creating a huge fireball that killed dozens, including rescue workers and photographers.

People stuck in the traffic jam caused by the accident were also killed in the blast that left a crater 20 metres wide and 3 metres deep near the town of Nadadores in the northern state of Coahuila, witnesses and officials said.

"We were waiting about 100 metres from the crash when there was an incredibly loud bang. Suddenly there were flying rocks and a fireball," said Silverio Alfonso Amador, 44, who was in the traffic jam and survived the explosion.

"It smashed our car windows," said the local steelworker, whose face was covered with burns and injured ears stuffed with cotton wool.

The tractor-trailer had collided with a pickup and burst into flames. Firemen at the scene were trying to put out the blaze when they ran out of water.

Moments later there was a huge explosion that almost obliterated the rig.

At least 29 people were killed and around 150 injured, up to 30 of them in serious condition in local hospitals, state officials said. Local radio reported that around 40 people had died.

Civil protection officials said the truck was carrying 25 tonnes of a form of the chemical ammonium nitrate, commonly used as fertilizer. It has also been used to make explosives, notably in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

Initial reports said the rig was carrying explosives but police said they did not know what its load was.

Soldiers and police cordoned off an area up to 1.6 km around the site of the blast, which badly damaged eight houses and blew out the windows of 60 others.

Witnesses said 26 wrecked and charred cars were hauled away from the scene.

Around 260 people living close to the site in a small desert roadside village called Selemania were evacuated.

"We found part of the engine," Coahuila state police chief Fausto Destenave-Kuri told Reuters. "The truck practically disintegrated."

Three of the dead were local journalists.

"Reporters who were taking photographs died there as well as emergency workers and drivers who stopped to help," state governor Humberto Moreira said.

- Reuters