RANGOON—With the first explosion, thousands of sleeping Rangoon residents jumped from their beds with little to no idea of what was happening.
The blast was so powerful that people all across the city could feel the tremor.
“I thought we'd been bombed,” said Ma Thandar who lives a few miles away from the blast site, recounting her initial reaction.
But, Ko Win Tun, 54, knew exactly what had happened.
"I immediately knew it came from the warehouse,” said the merchant, nursing his bandaged head while sitting in front of his damaged house amid a wasteland of charred iron beams and smoldering debris.
A pre-dawn fire that spread to several waterfront warehouses in Mingalar Taung Nyunt Township in eastern Rangoon caused an explosion that left at least 17 people dead and nearly 100 wounded, an official statement said on Thursday.
With several victims in the intensive care unit in Rangoon General Hospital, the death toll is expected to rise. Among the deceased are five firefighters.
Chemicals like sulfur, borax and saltpeter—ingredients in traditional Burmese medicines—were stored in the warehouses. According to the fire department director, these were the main culprits of the mayhem.
The blast left a 6 x 4.5-meter wide crater on the spot where the chemicals had been stored. The force of the explosion destroyed nearby houses, bringing them toppling to the ground.
Flying debris was a major contributor to the death toll. “People tried to run from the fire, but sadly many of them were killed by flying objects,” said one eye witness.
“Suddenly, I heard a big bang. A piece of concrete as large as a football hit the head of a guy running ahead of me, knocking his brains out,” Ko Win Tun said.
He said that he himself was also hit by flying rubble, but only small pieces, knocking him unconscious for a moment.
Just a few meters away, late in the morning, firemen were hosing down the smoldering debris. The air was littered with burning ashes.
Soldiers appeared in trucks eight hours after the blast. They started to remove the debris and transport hundreds of people whose homes had been devastated to relief camps. It was in fact a rare scene in a country where the military has a tendency to hide in their barracks when disasters struck in the past.
As the sun got higher in the sky, humanitarian aid started to trickle in—initially, from the relatives and friends of the victims. Before noon, more relief supplies had been delivered by well-wishers.
People camped out on the floor of a Buddhist monastery which had been hastily converted into a relief camp.
“We opened the monastery for use as a shelter at 3:30 am,” said a Red Cross officer. “So far [by Thursday, 12:30 pm], we have 1,143 victims.”
A donation counter had been set up a few feet from the Red Cross first aid booth where a group of military medical personnel treated the wounded.
Holding a lunch-box donated by a well-wisher, Ko Than Tun, 35, walked as if in a trance. He has lost his mother, wife and only son to the explosion, not to mention his house.
“They all are gone,” said the taxi driver. “But I'm haunted by the sight of my five-year old son hit by a piece of concrete. I really want to forget that hellish moment. But I can't.”
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