Government spokesman Isaac Maigua Mwaura said three Kenyans died and 280 others were taken to hospital after the explosion ignited a “huge ball of fire that spread widely”.The inferno damaged vehicles and many businesses, with a garment and textile factory burned to the ground.”Sadly, residential houses in the neighbourhood also caught fire, with a good number of residents still inside as it was late at night,” he added.Firefighters brought the blaze under control by Friday morning, more than nine hours after it erupted.Douglas Kanja, Deputy Inspector of Police, said a guard at the gas site had been arrested and investigations were ongoing.Residents said they had long feared such a disaster, accusing the government of being “irresponsible” by allowing inflammable products to be stored near their homes.”Why do we have gas plants in the middle of estates? This is a residential area and that is a gas plant right there. And it is not one, there are several,” Magdalene Kerubo, 34, told AFP.The Petroleum Institute of East Africa said the explosion occurred at an “illegal LPG refilling and storage site” whose owner and some customers had been convicted and sentenced in May 2023.It said the proprietor continued operating the the facility “without even the bare minimum safety standards and qualified LPG personnel as required by law”.Kenya’s Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (EPRA) also said it had denied permission three times last year for the construction of an LPG storage and filling plant at the site.”The main reason for the rejection was failure of the designs to meet the safety distances stipulated,” it said, noting “the high population density around the proposed site”.Embakasi is a residential and industrial area with a population of about one million according to the 2019 census and lies 10 kilometres (six miles) from Kenya’s main international airport.
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