Sierra Leone oil tanker explosion kills at least 99 people

A further 100 people have been taken to hospitals and clinics across the city, deputy health minister Amara Jambai said.

People walk by burning debris following the Freetown explosion (AP)

At least 99 people have been killed after an oil tanker exploded near Sierra Leone's capital early on Saturday morning.

The disaster happened after a bus struck the tanker at a petrol station in Wellington, a densely populated suburb east of Freetown.

Videos show a giant fireball burning into the sky following the explosion while survivors with severe burns cried out in pain.

The nation’s president, Julius Maada Bio, who is in Glasgow attending the United Nations Cop26 climate summit, lamented the “horrendous loss of life”.

“My profound sympathies with families who have lost loved ones and those who have been maimed as a result,” he tweeted.

Earlier in the morning, the National Disaster Management Agency’s (NDMA) director Brima Sesay said in a video posted on Facebook: “It’s a terrible, terrible incident that we’ve never seen before.

“We’re here as first responders, the NDMA; we’re here, the police are here and we have so many casualties, burnt corpses. So I have spoken to the commander joint force; he is sending trucks so that we can move the corpses to the Connaught Hospital mortuary.”

People look on at a pile of burnt motorbikes in the aftermath of a fuel tanker explosion in Freetown (AFP/Getty)

Freetown mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr said she was “deeply saddened” to hear about the incident.

“Deeply saddened to hear about the explosion along Bai Bureh Road, Wellington, after a bowser carrying fuel collided with a truck. My sympathies go to the families and loved ones of the victims of the explosion. May the souls of the departed rest in perfect peace,” she wrote on Twitter.