What started out as a thrill ride for two wagon drivers, ended in tragedy when one of the speeding vehicles collided with a bus, killing 10 people instantaneously and leaving 15 others injured.
The Multan-bound wagon was coming from Jalalpur Pir Wala, a sub district of Multan, carrying more than 25 passengers. It collided with a local bus at high speed.
When the two vehicles collided, the wagon flipped over four times before dismantling completely. Ten people, including the bus driver, two children and two by-standers, died on the spot.
An emergency was declared throughout hospitals in Multan.
The 15 injured were shifted to Multan’s Nishtar Hospital, where three of them had not gained consciousness till the filing of this report.
“Three of the injured are in critical condition,” Nishtar Hospital’s Saeed Akbar told The Express Tribune, adding that five had received severe head injuries.
Nurses at the hospital, who had been protesting over the past few days suspended their boycott and rushed in to assist the doctors with the emergency at hand.
Shujaabad Road has witnessed many similar accidents in the past. Taking that into account, the National Highway Authority (NHA) is constructing a ring road and flyovers to help prevent such tragedies in the future.
“We do everything on our part to ensure road safety, but the real challenge lies in getting drivers to understand how fatal their obsession with speeding can be,” city traffic officer Nazar Abbas Awan said while talking to The Express Tribune.
“We recently organised a seminar to pay tribute to the victims of such road accidents. We invited civil society as well as public transport drivers just so we could create awareness among them,” he added.
The bodies from Thursday’s accident were barely recognisable. Till the filing of this report, authorities were only able to identify one who they said hailed from Jalalpur Peerwala.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 25th, 2011.
COMMENTS
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ