AT-KABUL: At least 11 people, mostly children, died and 18 others injured when a gas carrier truck exploded outside the western city of Herat last night.
As many as 18 people were wounded in the explosion late Monday. Four male victims with 90 percent burns were shifted to Iran for better treatment, Rafiq Sherzai, spokesman for the provincial hospital told Afghanistan Times.
“A woman and 10 children are among the killed people,” Sherzai said.
The explosion was reported last night at 10:30 pm inside the compound of a gas supply company, adjacent to a camp for internally displaced people, Herat police spokesman Abdul Rauf Ahmadi said.
The explosion was so powerful that the burning truck flung into the camp, he said.
Gas explosions are not uncommon in Afghanistan, where bottled gas is used for household cooking nationwide.
The gas terminal is located on Herat-Turkmenistan border port city of Torghondi, from where the traders import gas to the reservoirs. Then supply it to rest of the provinces.