Rocky route: Coach plunges into ravine, killing five

LANDI KOTAL:

As many as five people, including three women, were killed and 13 others were injured when a passenger coach fell into a ravine in Landikotal tehsil of Khyber Agency near the Torkham border on Tuesday.

All passengers in the coach were Afghan nationals who were heading back to their country from Peshawar and other parts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, said Torkham Political Tehsildar Naik Muhammad.

According to initial reports, the coach had 18 people on board when it fell into the ravine in Sapari area. The political tehsildar, along with several khasadar officials, rushed to the site soon after the accident. They shifted the bodies and injured people to Agency Headquarters Hospital in three ambulances.

According to doctors, most of the injured people were stable.

The passenger vehicle had taken an alternate route to the border as a portion of the Peshawar-Torkham Road, beyond Landikotal, is under construction from the last two years. Due to the construction, the political administration has diverted traffic towards an unpaved and mountainous route which has been causing problems for people using the route.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 11^th, 2015.