2002 Lagos armoury explosion

Accidental bomb detonation

The Lagos armoury explosion was the accidental detonation of a large stock of high explosives at a military storage facility in the city of Lagos, Nigeria, on 27 January 2002. The fires created by the debris from this explosion burnt down a large section of Northern Lagos, and created a panic that spread to other areas. As people fled the flames, many stumbled into a concealed canal and drowned. The explosion and its aftermath are believed to have killed at least 1,100 people and displaced over 20,000, with many thousands injured or homeless. The government of Nigeria launched an enquiry, which blamed the Nigerian Army for failing to properly maintain the base, or to decommission it when instructed to do so in 2001.

Ikeja Cantonment was a large Nigerian Army living and storage area in the city of Lagos, situated north of the city centre near the districts of Isolo and Onigbongo. On the afternoon of 27 January, a fire broke out in a street market being held next to the base, which was also home to the families of soldiers. As the streets became more and more crowded, explosions amid the fleeing crowds from shells falling from the initial explosion created panic. A stampede developed as panicking people fled in all directions, trampling those who fell underfoot. Reports also describe people jumping from burning high rise buildings and being killed in desperate attempts to cross the busy Ikeja dual carriageway.

In central Lagos there is a large canal, which runs from north to south parallel to the Isolo Oshodi expressway through the centre of the city. It borders a banana plantation, which many refugees thought might be safe from the falling shells and spreading fires. Those on the bottom were crushed by yet more people falling into the waterway, and in the struggling confusion, at least 600 people were killed, many of them children. Many of these bodies drifted down the canal, some being found as far as ten kilometers from the explosion. The affected areas of the city burned through most of the night, with explosions continuing to boil out of the wrecked armoury until the afternoon of 28 January. The emergency services were woefully inadequate to deal with the devastation, as there were not enough fire crews or water points available to cope with the fire, which consequently consumed large parts of the city's northern suburbs. City hospitals were also utterly overwhelmed, many injured going for hours without any medical attention even if they did manage to reach an undamaged medical facility. In addition to the dead, at least 5,000 people were injured in the disaster and over 12,000 left homeless, with entire districts of the city gutted. About 20,000 people had fled the city on the night of the explosion, and the survivors gradually returned over the course of the next week. On the evening of 28 January, George Emdin, the commander of the Ikeja base who had not been present during the explosion, issued a statement:

<blockquote>"On behalf of the military, we are sorry, this is an old ammunition depot with high calibre bombs some efforts were being made in the recent past to try to improve the storage facility, but this accident happened before the high authorities could do what was needed"

Numerous relief agencies, including the Red Cross and Red Crescent, provided aid to the thousands of homeless and lost people in the weeks following the disaster, attempting to reunite at least 2,000 separated or displaced families. The recovery process in Ikeja took some years as the rebuilding program was both lengthy and expensive, with many people suffering homelessness and poverty in this period due to the loss of their houses and livelihoods in the fire.