ISLAMABAD, 4 August 2003 — Blasts in northern Pakistan killed over 50 people and injured nearly 160 others in an incident described as being of “accidental nature.” The tragedy wiped out at least three-fourths of a village, officials told Arab News on telephone.
Police said the village of Gayal, 168 kilometers south of Gilgit, a mountainous and mostly tribal area close to the Kashmir border with India, was shaken from slumber by a series of blasts that caused panic as locals first mistook it for a terrorist act or artillery fire from across the line of control. However, it soon transpired that a house owned by a private contractor had caught fire by electric short circuit.
Some 200 villagers rushed to the spot in an apparent attempt to extinguish the fire. Within minutes, explosives intended for rock-blasting stored at the house began to explode, causing widespread carnage, witnesses reported.
“The owner of the house, Mohammad Waris, was involved in road-building and construction of irrigation projects. He survived, but his son and daughter died, and his wife was seriously injured,” according to local official Taj Mohammad.
The highest administration official in the region, Mohammad Amir, confirmed the death of 41 people. Another 13 are missing, while more than 60 people were rushed to hospitals in the nearby areas of Chilas Valley and Diamer. The northern area comprises the hilly regions of Skardu and Gilgit and is a scenic tourist spot but suffers from poverty.
Pakistan Television reported that 150 of the wounded were evacuated by army helicopters to hospitals, but officials expected casualties to mount. The village of Gayal has some 400 houses, some built with bricks, but mostly hutments or constructed of mud. Over 250 of them were razed to the ground, raising fears that many of their inhabitants may have been buried. Whether they area dead or alive will be known in next 24 hours.
Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmad ruled out foul play, terming the tragedy an accident. About 70 people were brought to Chilas hospitals with serious injuries, said a doctor, Hameed Khan, who complained that life-saving drugs and medicines were in short supply.
Local administration and army were trying to replenish the stocks, but were faced by logistic problems. The terrain is mostly inaccessible. A metaled road connects Gilgit city with Islamabad, the nation’s capital, but access to villages poses serious problems. Helicopters were the most effective means, but their mobilization required time.
“It was an unprecedented disaster, unparalleled except during earthquakes, which have repeatedly struck the region,” one official said.
Officials declared an emergency in hospitals, and witnesses reported weeping relatives looking for loved ones among the ruins, but little help was available in the confusion in the wake of the accident.
