AN EXPLOSION has rocked the Trans-Niger pipeline in the Bodo community, Gokana Local Government Area (LGA) of Rivers State.
A resident of Bodo, who spoke to Channels Television, said that the blast took place on the onshore pipeline near the starting point of the Bodo-Bonny road. It reportedly occurred on Monday night along the pipeline that transports crude to the Bonny Export Terminal in Rivers State.
In viral videos of the explosion spotted by Channels Television, thick black smoke billowed into the sky as the fire surged into the mangrove.
Rivers is a map oil-producing state in Nigeria.
While the fire has been put out, the cause of the explosion is unknown at this time. But investigations are ongoing over the incident.
“Up till this moment, we have not been able to get clear details as to what caused that very explosion but investigations are going on,” the Minister of Regional Affairs Abubakar Momoh said on Channels Television’s Lunchtime Politics.
But he said, “I think in due time, a clear picture” of what happened will be known.
When Channels Television visited the scene of the explosion on Tuesday afternoon, some members of the community were seen keeping watch over the area.
Following the incident, police authorities in the oil-rich state say they have arrested two persons over the inferno.
In a statement, the spokesperson of the Rivers State Police Command Grace Iringe-Iroko said the persons were “taken in for questioning as part of efforts to uncover any potential act of sabotage”.
But she called for calm, saying “As a result of a swift intervention, the situation is now under control, and there is no further threat to residents or the environment”.
