More than 140 people have lost their lives after a fuel-loaded wooden boat caught fire and capsized on the Congo River in the Democratic Republic of Congo earlier this week.
The incident, which occurred on Tuesday near Mbandaka—the capital of Equateur Province—happened where the Congo and Ruki rivers intersect.
Confirming the grim figures on Saturday, national parliamentarian Josephine-Pacifique Lokumu said the vessel was overloaded with hundreds of passengers when the blaze erupted.
Authorities recovered 131 bodies by Wednesday, with another 12 found on Thursday and Friday, some of them badly charred. Civil society leader Joseph Lokondo, who helped organize mass burials, reported a provisional death toll of 145, noting that several victims drowned, while others died in the fire.
According to Lokumu, the fire was triggered when a woman lit a cooking fire too close to the boat’s fuel storage, sparking a deadly explosion that quickly engulfed the wooden vessel.
Disturbing video footage circulating online captured the boat ablaze on the river, with nearby canoes unable to offer help.
The exact number of passengers on board remains unclear, though estimates suggest several hundred people were involved. Survivors have been taken to local hospitals, while families continue to search for missing loved ones.
In the DRC, river transport remains a critical lifeline due to limited road infrastructure, but poor safety practices frequently result in deadly accidents. Similar disasters claimed dozens of lives in 2023, and nearly 100 people died in a boat accident on Lake Kivu in 2019.
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