Gas Fire Incident in Wondongo Village in Buea Leaves Three People Severely Injured

By Moki S. Mokondo in Buea for Fako UK / Fako News Centre

A gas fire in the house of Mama Clara Mojoko mo Ngoina(the Monyonge family house) on the 4th of March 2009 in Wondongo village in Buea left her grandson Edwin Kombe Monyonge, Bridget Yondo(wife of Kombe Monyonge) and their young son severely burnt, and at this time of writing, are in intensive care at the Buea Hospital Annex.

On Wednesday 4th of March, Edwin Kombe Monyonge, a worker with Buea University, had bought cooking gas in the normal heavy gas bottle used in Cameroon, and took it home to the Monyonge family house in Wondongo, just next to the wrestling field. It was a dark evening all across Buea because of a power blackout. Kombe Monyonge tried to connect the gas bottle to the cooker and realised that gas was leaking from the gas bottle. We do not know yet whether the leakage was due to a fault in the bottle or due to Kombe Monyonge not properly fitting the gas bottle to the cooker. The leakage went on for a while and on sensing danger, the entire Monyonge family opened windows in the house and then left the house and stood in the wrestling field. They also took along the heavy gas bottle, which at that stage had lost more than half the amount of gas in it through the leakage at the house.

After a while, Kombe Monyonge, his wife Bridget who is expecting and due this same week, and their four year old son thought the gas in the house had cleared and decided to go back in. It was still very dark because of the blackout. When they entered the house, Bridget lit a candle and immediately, the lower floor of the Monyonge family house was engulfed in flames. The three of them were severely burnt. They struggled to escape from the flames, and people helped them stay clear of the building and took them to hospital straightaway. Then a few minutes after, a mighty explosion occurred in the house.

The explosion from the fire shattered the window frames, protectors and the roof around the staircase leading to the upper floor of the building. A taxi parked nearby was completely destroyed in the explosion.

A relative who lives about two hundred metres away from the disaster scene, Simon Gobina, maintained that he thought it was the mountain (Mt Cameroon) that had erupted when he heard the explosion from the building. The explosion was heard in the surrounding villages and as far as Clerks’ Quarters. Within twenty minutes of the explosion, the Monyonge family compound was swamped by over three hundred people.