{"id":119328,"date":"2025-05-31T15:50:11","date_gmt":"2025-05-31T14:50:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/?p=119328"},"modified":"2025-05-31T15:53:19","modified_gmt":"2025-05-31T14:53:19","slug":"tragedy-as-20-kano-athletes-killed-in-fatal-road-crash-after-national-sports-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/news\/tragedy-as-20-kano-athletes-killed-in-fatal-road-crash-after-national-sports-festival\/","title":{"rendered":"Tragedy as 20 Kano Athletes Killed in Fatal Road Crash After National Sports Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">By Oscar Okhifo<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">The National Sports Festival has ended badly for &#8216;Team kano&#8217; as tragedy hits on their way back to base. At least 20 athletes from the\u00a0 State contingent have been confirmed dead following a tragic motor accident at Dakatsalle Bridge in the Kura Local Government Area of the State.<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">The athletes were returning to Kano\u00a0 from the recently concluded National Sports Festival held in Abeokuta, Ogun State, when the fatal incident happened.<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">Confirming the heartbreaking development, the Chairman of the Kano State Sports Commission, Umar Fagge, said the accident claimed the lives of 20 athletes, while several others sustained various degrees of injuries.<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">He narrated how it happened; &#8220;The bus conveying 30 athletes fell from the bridge, leading to the death of the 20 athletes,\u201d Fagge explained.<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cAs I am talking to you now, we have counted 19 dead bodies,\u201d he added.<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">Ado Salisu, a former Vice President of the Sports Writers Association of Nigeria (SWAN), also confirmed the tragedy and stated that injured victims were still being transported to Kura General Hospital for treatment.<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">When contacted, the Public Relations Officer of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), Kano Sector Command, Abdullahi Labaran, acknowledged the accident but could not verify the total number of casualties.<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201c It is true. We just received the report of the accident, but, I cannot confirm the exact number of casualties at the moment,\u201d he said.<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\">Team Kano won 2 Silver and two Bronze medals in the competition. As more\u00a0 details emerge, the public will be notified.<\/div>\n<div class=\"yj6qo\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"adL\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"adL\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Related Posts generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Oscar Okhifo The National Sports Festival has ended badly for &#8216;Team kano&#8217; as tragedy hits on their way back to base. At least 20 athletes from the\u00a0 State contingent&hellip;<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Related Posts generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":119331,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-119328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Tragedy as 20 Kano Athletes Killed in Fatal Road Crash After National Sports Festival - Pointblank News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/news\/tragedy-as-20-kano-athletes-killed-in-fatal-road-crash-after-national-sports-festival\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Tragedy as 20 Kano Athletes Killed in Fatal Road Crash After National Sports Festival - Pointblank News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Oscar Okhifo The National Sports Festival has ended badly for &#8216;Team kano&#8217; as tragedy hits on their way back to base. 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