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	The remains of the cargo train carrying three gas cylinders after it crashed into a parked goods train at a station south of Nairobi, early Sunday, Aug. 20, 2000, causing an explosion which destroyed nearby houses. Eighteen people were killed and dozens of others injured. (AP Photo/Stringer)

August 21, 2000 

ATHI RIVER (AP) - Nine runaway train cars, six carrying liquefied gas, derailed at a station south of Nairobi, igniting a fireball that killed 16 people, injured dozens and consumed nearby houses, witnesses and officials said Sunday.

Of the dead, 13 where railway employees or their families who lived in homes inside Athi station's grounds, 25 kilometers (15 miles) south of the capital, Kenya Railways said in a statement. The dead were believed to be sleeping when the train cars derailed and exploded around midnight (2100 hours GMT) Saturday. The other three killed were in the area from nearby slums, officials said.

At least 36 were injured, some with severe burns, local hospitals reported.

"They looked like ashes. Only two could be seen as bodies," said Richard Njiru, an ambulance driver who transported some of the victims.

There were some 30 houses around the station, a number of which had been reduced to charred rubble.

"There was liquid fire in the air which was dropping like it was raining fire," said Anthony Chira, whose house was damaged in the accident. "I thank God for being alive because some people were burnt beyond recognition. People were running and shouting with fire on their heads."

Police officers in plain clothes remove a body from a destroyed house after eighteen people were killed and dozens injured when a cargo train carrying three gas cylinders crashed into a parked goods train at a station south of Nairobi, early Sunday, Aug.20, 2000, causing an explosion which destroyed nearby houses. Most of the victims were residents of railway houses. (AP Photo/Stringer)

Chira, who lives in a railway-owned house within the station's grounds, 50 meters (yards) from where the explosions took place, told The Associated Press that he was woken around midnight by the "feel of heat." He then saw fire everywhere and heard explosions "again and again."

Two of the three rooms in Chira's home, which he shares with his wife, three children and a railway employee, were gutted by the fire.

More than 16 hours after the crash, houses and carriages were still smoldering as firefighters and railway engineers cleaned up the site.

The mangled carriages were spread across six lines of track, and trees and grass within a 100 meter (yard) radius were scorched.

The accident was caused by train cars reversing down the track out of control after being detached from a freight train, police and railway officials said. The cars were detached at a station a few kilometers (miles) from the town of Athi River as the train headed toward Nairobi from Mombasa.

On reaching Athi station, which is in Athi River, the cars derailed and exploded on impact, said Kariuki Kimani, the police officer in charge of Athi River.

"They call it runaways, maybe something went wrong. We need to investigate," said Esther Otieno, deputy operations director at the station. Detaching the train cars was "normal" procedure, Otieno said.

A railway official at the scene said there had been a problem with the train's pulling power so the nine cars had been detached to reduce its load.

"It was not expected that the carriages would roll back," the official, who did not want to be named, said.

Kenya has seen a series of deadly train derailments in the last year. Seven passengers died and 38 were injured Wednesday after a train went off the tracks in western Kenya. Last year, 32 people were killed when a passenger train derailed on the same line as Sunday's train.