A 4-year-old girl identified as Faridat Shittu and her grandparents are currently in a critical condition at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH) after a cooking gas explosion ravaged a three-storey building along Odubanwo Street, off Olaniyi Street, Gbinrinmi in Ojokoro Local Council Development Area of Lagos.
Her uncle also suffered varying degrees of burns in the incident that occurred on Sunday.
Daily Trust learnt that the grandmother was frying meat when the oil caught fire.
Efforts to douse the fire were said to have failed as it led to the explosion of the cooking gas.
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It was learnt that the little girl was sleeping in her room when the incident happened around 2pm. The fire was later put out and the victims rescued by community members.
The Territorial Coordinator of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) in the South-West, Ibrahim Farinloye, confirmed the incident.
Farinloye said the building with 14 rooms and shops was reduced to rubble due to the intensity of the explosion which rendered about 11 families homeless.
“The landlord, Pa Femi Odubanwo Solomon, disclosed that neighbours saved him from dying in the incident as he was initially trapped. The landlord is presently squatting in a church opposite his destroyed house,” he added.
Similarly, an outbreak of fire which occurred on Sunday destroyed, about 100 building materials shops, 18 iron/steel recycling shops, 19 diesel lister generators, and 34 different types of motorcycle machines in the Abule-Egba area of Lagos.
Also destroyed by fire were five 14-seaters buses, three cars and two trucks.
The Chairman of Ojokoro LCDA and his medical team rendered assistance to the victims of the two incidents that happened in the area.
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