Arepo fire explosion will not affect products supply---NNPC

(Nigeria) The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, said that the recent pipeline explosion at Arepo would not affect products supply.

Its Group General Manager (Public Affairs), Mr Ohi Alegbe, disclosed this to News Agency of Nigeria on Wednesday in Abuja.

Alegbe said the corporation had shut down its System 2B Pipeline due to the fire incident that was sparked off by a gun battle between suspected oil thieves and policemen deployed to protect the pipeline.

He stressed that the development would not affect products supply.

Alegbe said all the inland depots, being serviced by the System 2B pipeline, had enough stock of products to meet demand until the situation would be brought under control.

He said that preliminary report from the police indicated that armed men, in military uniform and suspected to be oil thieves, attacked the police on guard at the Arepo section of the pipeline.

“The gunfire exchange between the vandals and the policemen apparently sparked off an explosion on the pipeline resulting in an inferno. The police have reported that nine of its men are still unaccounted for, while those that survived the attack sustained bullet wounds and have been taken to hospital.

``All the police boats were destroyed in the creek, rendering it difficult for the police to move in search of their men,” he said.

Alegbe said it was not possible to send the corporation’s engineers into the area now under the circumstances.

The Spokesperson for the Pipelines and Products Marketing Company, Mr Nasir Imodagbe,  however, said that the fire was put out on Tuesday.

``We used water from Atlas Cove to put out the fire; this took a full day of pumping,” he said.

Imodagbe said the PPMC had not moved engineers to the site to commence the repairs because there had not been any security clearance yet.

According to him “when there is security clearance from the police, we will move in to effect repairs”.