The Londiani Sub-county Hospital Mortuary in Kericho County is overstretched with 49 bodies from the Friday night accident involving a truck that was headed for Rwanda.
The number of victims of the accident rose to 52 on Saturday with two succumbing to injuries at Kericho County Referral Hospital and another two at Nakuru Level 5 hospital.
While the morgue is designed for 16 bodies, it is holding 33 more, according to the hospital management.
By press time, 15 bodies had been identified by relatives and were waiting to be transferred to other spacious facilities in Kericho and Nakuru counties ahead of postmortem being undertaken.
Two bodies are lying at Kericho County Referral Hospital Mortuary after the victims succumbed to the injuries while undergoing treatment while another one is at the Nakuru Level 6 hospital mortuary.
Dr Collins Kipkoech, the Londiani sub county hospital superintendent confirmed that the mortuary was overstretched and needed to be decongested.
“The extra bodies need to be moved from the mortuary after positive identification by the relatives of the victims,” Dr Kipkoech said during a briefing at the facility to senior government officials on Saturday.
As a result of the congestion, the Kenya Red Cross Society has procured 20 body bags to enable families who had identified the victims to transfer the bodies for reservation in other facilities.
“We are awaiting for the delivery of 20 body bags in what in our estimation will help a great deal in decongesting the mortuary,” Mr Jethro Koech, the Kenya Red Cross South Rift Valley Regional Manager said.
Mr Koech said while briefing Cabinet Secretaries – Mr Kipchumba Murkomen (Roads), Mr Zack Njeru (Lands), Principal Secretary for Interior Raymond Omollo and his Trade counterpart Alfred K’ombudo, Senate Majority Leader Aaron Cheruiyot and Kericho Governor Erick Mutai that Red Cross had also set up trauma and counseling centres in Kericho County Referral hospital and Londiani Sub county hospitals.
Breaks of a truck that was heading to Kericho from Nakuru side is said to have failed before it rammed into several matatus, a bus, motorcycles and overran hawkers, pedestrians and passengers at the bus stage on the Londiani junction before landing in a ditch.
Families jammed the hospital and made a beeline for the mortuary through a side entrance to identify the bodies of their loved ones who perished in the grizzly accident.
Police and hospital security officers had a hectic time controlling the crowd that turned up to view the bodies of the victims who succumbed to injuries following the accident.
Religious leaders and counselors were struggling to handle the high number of relatives and friends of the victims who were overwhelmed with grief as some wailed and fainted after viewing the bodies.
At one stage, the crowd almost turned rowdy when the police prevented them from going into the mortuary all at once to view the bodies, but order was quickly restored.
Dismembered bodies were strewn on the floor of the morgue with doctors saying it will take time before reconstruction (of the parts) is completed.
“We will need the families of the victims to assist us in piecing together the parts in the reconstruction process. It is a tough call,” Dr Koech said.
There was concern that the families were allowed to move the bodies before a postmortem is conducted to establish the cause of death.
Dr Erick Mutai, the Kericho Governor said the county was in dire need of a pathologist as the ones who conduct the examinations on the victims are from Nakuru county.
“Apart from a pathologist, there is a need to increase the number of counselors to assist the affected families to come to terms with the reality of losing their loved ones,” Dr Mutai said.
“Seeing the bodies the way they are is very traumatising for all of us due to the state and the high number of the victims,” Mr Peter Mungai, who lost a relative in the accident, said.
Mr Erick Bett, whose younger brother Dennis Bett, a boda boda rider succumbed to injuries while being rushed to hospital for treatment said the high number of casualties was in itself traumatizing to the families and the residents.
“Some of the people who came here have unfortunately been unable to identify the bodies of their relatives and have been forced to travel to hospitals in Kericho and Nakuru counties to search among the survivors,” Mr Bett said, adding that he had identified his brother’s body.
