Dock accident badly burns worker

Heavy black smoke poured out from Uliga Dock Friday after an inebriated worker accidentally touched off a fuel fire while lighting a cigarette. Photo: Hilary Hosia.
Heavy black smoke poured out from Uliga Dock Friday after an inebriated worker accidentally touched off a fuel fire while lighting a cigarette. Photo: Hilary Hosia.

HILARY HOSIA

Jakmis Kabot lays motionless on his hospital bed at the surgical ward in Majuro hospital Wednesday morning, six days after his entire body caught on fire at Uliga Dock.

“I feel a burning sensation inside me,” he said. “I wish to be transferred out of here. The fire got me most on my back.”

Jakmis said he was a little intoxicated at the time of the accident and that he was smoking next to where fueling was in process. Everything was a blur after that he said.

The fire explosion was captured by the Journal’s camera several miles away from Delap dock at exactly 11:10am.

Jakmis is one of the Shipping Corporation’s best workers, according to General Manager Wally Milne. But he ended up wrong place at the wrong time Friday. Last year, Jakmis rescued a young boy from drowning after the boy fell overboard from the MV Aemman into the open ocean near Ailinglaplap.

Read more about this in the September 2, 2016 edition of the Marshall Islands Journal.