A 40-tonne truck conveying several cartons of beer from Enugu to Calabar, this evening killed six persons and left several others in critical condition on the long stretch of road between Abaomege, Ebonyi State, through Itigidi, Abi LGA and fatally terminating in Ugep, Yakurr LGA, Cross River State, www.calitown.com can reveal.
Investigations revealed that the truck, initially believed to have knocked down a commercial motorcyclist in Abaomege, while on the run from a pack of chasing commercial cyclists, ran into a few other persons in Itigidi, Abi LGA, before making its way to Ugep, Yakurr LGA, where under pressure from the chasing pack, ran into a one-storey building, off the Ikom/Calabar highway, several metres away from the very busy roadside market in Ijiman, Ugep.
At press time, more than a dozen persons in very critical condition have been rushed to the General Hospital, Ugep, while frantic efforts were being made to cut through the truck and rescue the driver and the conductor, stuck in the truck with what appears to be multiple leg fractures to the two. The corpse of an unidentified lady was spotted under the truck which has destroyed a considerable part of the one-storey building, while two parked vehicles and five motorcycles suffered considerable damage.
“If the driver had stopped after he hit the first casualty in Abaomege, we would not have witnessed this carnage. I think too that he may have driven away out of fear, but the outcome of that action has left a trail of sorrow and blood”, an eyewitness in the area told us.
