[3] People in the adjacent densely populated shanty town of Sinai had started to collect leaking fuel when at about 10 a.m. a massive explosion occurred at the scene.
[6] Energy Minister Kiraitu Murungi is reported as saying that the disaster began when a pipeline valve failed under pressure allowing the oil to leak into the sewer.
[3] The exact death toll remains uncertain due to some bodies being badly charred or lost in the murky waters of a nearby river.
[9] In November 2011, The Kenya Pipeline Company funded the delivery to the Ministry of Public Health and Sanitation a computer and software system to facilitate forensic DNA identification of victims.
[18] Prime minister Raila Odinga and vice-president Kalonzo Musyoka have visited the scene and various hospitals to console injured victims and to condole bereaved families.
[7] The National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) said it will act against the KPC for failing to enforce EMCA 1999—and suggests that if the required spill containment measures were in place at the facility the oil would not have run off into the drains.
[19] In 2009 journalist John Ngirachu wrote[7] for the local newspaper Daily Nation and reported that the slums in Sinai being located so near to the pipeline were a disaster waiting to happen.