The Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) has revealed that a total of one hundred and forty-six passengers in the ill-fated Abuja-Kaduna train attach are still unreachable.
In a statement released on Monday by the Managing Director of the NRC Mr Fidet Okhiria disclosed that despite the high number of missing passengers, the number of safe passengers has risen to 186.
Okhiria further revealed that 51 phone numbers on the manifest have been unreachable since the incident, 35 other phone numbers on the manifest are ringing, but no response from the other end and 60 phone numbers are non-existent.
Okhiria also disclosed that 22 persons are reported missing by their relatives and eight persons were confirmed dead.
The statement partly read, “51 phone numbers on the manifest are either switched off or have not been reachable since Tuesday morning and 35 phone numbers on the manifest are ringing, but no response from the other end. 60 phone numbers on the manifest when called, responded non-existent.
”The statement is aimed at updating Nigerians on the ongoing development regarding the clearing of the incident site and status of Passengers that were onboard the AK9 train of Monday, March 28.
”Of the 362 validated passengers on board the attacked AK9 train service on March 28, 186 persons on the manifest are confirmed safe and at their various homes (additional 14 persons confirmed safe today). Two coaches (SP 00016 and SP 00017) earlier re-railed have safely been moved to Rigasa Station.
”This brings the total number of recovered Coaches and safely moved to NRC Stations to be seven. Intensive work continues on track repairs. More concrete Sleepers were moved to the site while some sections of twisted tracks have been straightened.
”We remain grateful to the security agencies for all the support. We are appreciative of Squadron Commander MOPOL 1 Kaduna’s visit to the accident site today. NRC will continue to update the general public of developments to prevent misleading information and falsehood.”
