- A fire broke out in a truck hauling diesel fuel to a town in southern Libya, medical and security officials said.
- The death toll is expected to grow as 50 are injured, with some suffering from critical injuries, officials said.
- Libyan Prime Minister Abdulhamid Al-Dbeibah tweeted that officials were “closely following the disaster”.
TRIPOLI: Five people were killed and 50 were injured late on Sunday when a fire broke out in a truck hauling diesel fuel to a town in southern Libya, according to medical and security officials.
On both sides of the road in the Ezwaiya neighbourhood of the Bent Bayya municipality were a burnt truck and several other scorched vehicles, as seen in Internet images shared by locals.
Five charred bodies were discovered inside or near automobiles, according to three medical sources, who added that the death toll was expected to grow as there were critical injuries among the injured.
It was unclear whether the truck’s driver was among the dead.
“The truck was involved in a traffic accident and overturned,” a security source stated.
The source reported that after the truck overturned but before it caught fire, individuals from other vehicles approached it in an attempt to steal petrol from its tank.
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“(Those) citizens approached it to refuel without realising the magnitude of the danger,” the source said. “Unfortunately, the fire broke out in the truck and resulted in the casualties.”
Libya has had a fuel crisis since 2014 when the country was divided by a civil war after Muammar Qaddafi’s 2011 ouster.
In a number of cities, residents are required to wait, sometimes for hours, in lengthy lines to refill their vehicles.
Abdulhamid Al-Dbeibah, the Prime Minister of the Government of National Unity based in Tripoli, tweeted that officials were “closely following the disaster in Bent Bayya municipality.”
Dbeibah stated that orders were issued to transport the injured to major hospitals.
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