June 3 disaster: Mahama lays wreath

President John Mahama Friday June 3 led a wreath-laying ceremony at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle, the scene of an explosion that wiped out 153 lives at the busy enclave on a rainy Wednesday night, June 3, 2015.

In an earlier tweet, the president said government would continue to correct developments that led to the disaster.

The mayor of Accra, Alfred Okoe Vanderpuije, speaking at a solemn ceremony at the Rev. Ernest Bruce Memorial Methodist Church at Adabraka in Accra, a few hundred metres from the scene, said the continued dredging of the Odaw drain would avert a recurrence of last year’s fire and flood disaster.

He called on Ghanaians to help identify some more deceased persons that are still in the mortuaries.

The June 3 disaster, as it has become known, happened after torrential rains hit the capital for several hours, rendering mainly the Kwame Nkrumah Circle and surrounding areas flooded.

The flood waters had seeped into the underground tanks for fuel storage, displacing the fuel unto the ground surface, which ignited from a spark nearby. It claimed more than 150 lives, with several others drowning in other areas, bringing the death toll to about 160.