An explosion inside a truck on Saturday killed five people and injured 15 others on the outskirts of northern Nigeria’s largest city of Kano, police said.
The ordnance ripped through the truck inside a metal scrap collection yard as trucks laden with scrap metal took turns to offload their cargo.
The victims were taken to a hospital in the city where “five people were confirmed dead while 15 others are receiving treatment”, Ibrahim Adamu Bakori, Kano state’s police commissioner said.
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“Our IED (improvised explosive device) unit is still at the scene conducting investigations to determine how the explosive detonated,” Bakori said.
The truck was coming into the city from northeastern Yobe state, among the state gripped by a 16-year-long jihadist insurgency, he added.
Yobe and neighbouring Borno state are a huge source of scrap metal from vehicles, homes and other machinery burnt due to jihadist violence and military operations against jihadist groups.
Metal scavengers occasionally collect unexploded ordnance as scrap metal, which can cause death and injury when it explodes.
AFP