HERAT, Afghanistan (AP) – A fuel tanker exploded at the Islam Qala junction in the western province of Herat on the Iranian border on Saturday, injuring at least seven people and causing a massive fire that consumed more than 500 trucks with natural gas and fuel. . to Afghan officials and Iranian state media.
It was not immediately clear what caused the explosion. Wahid Qatali, Herat’s provincial governor, said the first Afghan respondents did not have the means to put out the huge fire, and that he requested Iran’s support in the form of firefighting aircraft.
“For the time being, we can not even talk about the victims,” Qatali told The Associated Press.
The intensity of the flames meant that ambulances had difficulty reaching the wounded or getting close to the scene of the explosion, Mohammad Rafiq Shirzy, spokesperson for the regional hospital in the capital of Herat, also called Herat.
Seven people injured by the fire have so far been admitted to hospital, he said.
Iran’s semi-official ISNA news agency quoted truck drivers as burning more than 500 trucks with natural gas and fuel.
Two explosions at the border crossing were powerful enough to be spotted by NASA satellites from space. The one explosion erupted around 13:10 Afghan time (0840 GMT), the next about half an hour later at 13:42 local time (0912 GMT).
The fire continued to burn after the evening, forcing Afghanistan to cut off its electricity supply from Iran and leave Herat in the dark, said Wahidullah Tawhidi, spokesperson for the Ministry of Power Supply.
The road between the city of Herat and Islam Qala is a dangerous stretch of highway that Afghans rarely travel at night for fear of attacks by criminal gangs. Taliban insurgents also travel freely in the area. Afghan security services set up checkpoints and were assisting ambulances and emergency vehicles traveling to and from the border crossing.
According to the Iranian state-run IRNA news agency, Iranian “rescue forces and firefighters are putting out the fire in Afghanistan”, at the request of Herat’s governor, according to Mohsen Nejat, director general of crisis management in Khorasan Razavi province in Iran.
The fire spread to the Dogharoon customs facilities on the Iranian side of the border and the first responders – including the fire brigade, the Iranian army and border forces – helped put out the fire, according to Iranian state television. The Afghan side of the border crossing has its own fire brigade, but officials in Herat said they did not control the fire even in the first few minutes.
The border crossing of Islam Qala is about 120 kilometers west of the city of Herat and is an important transit route between Afghanistan and Iran.
The United States allows Afghanistan to import fuel and oil from Iran as part of a special concession that exempts Kabul from US sanctions against Iran. Satellite photos taken before the blast on Saturday showed dozens of tankers parked at the border crossing.
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Vahdat contributed from Tehran, Iran.