| Followup from yesterday. |
“It was a terrible scene. Many shops and houses were destroyed,” said one resident, Jassem, 42, who rushed from his home to help pull people from the rubble after hearing the explosion that rocked central Baghdad.
Police said 305 people were wounded. The casualties swamped the capitalÂ’s hospitals. There were chaotic scenes at Ibn al Nafis hospital in central Baghdad, where hallways overflowed with wounded on trolleys. Emergency workers dragged bodies from the debris and piled them on pickup trucks, a Reuters reporter at the scene said.