ISLAMABAD: At least 18 people were killed on Tuesday and several others were injured after a bus traveling from the northern Gilgit region to Rawalpindi had a head-on crash with a car, officials said.
Fatal road accidents are common in Pakistan, where traffic rules are rarely followed and roads, particularly in many rural areas, are in poor condition.
There have been a number of transport tragedies in Pakistan recently, including when more than 40 people were killed after a bus fell into a ravine and caught fire in the southern Pakistani province of Balochistan last month. Earlier this month, a head-on collision between a passenger bus and a speeding truck trailer near a tunnel in Pakistan’s northwestern Kohat District overnight killed at least 17 passengers, including women and children.
The latest crash happened in the Shatial region in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
“A Gilgit to Rawalpindi bound bus met with an accident in the Shatial area of Kohistan at 715pm,” Fiaz Ahmad, deputy commissioner Diamer district in Gilgit-Baltistan, told Arab News over the phone.
“The accident took place when the bus collided with a car coming from the opposite direction.”
The official said 18 people had been killed, of whom 13 were from Gilgit-Baltistan and five were from Kohistan.
Ahmed said district administration, Rescue 1122 and hospital staff had taken part on the rescue mission and shifted all injured passengers to a nearby hospital in Chilas.
Dildar Khan, a police chief in the area where the accident took place, told AP 22 people had died.
Imam Shafi, a Gilgit-Baltistan Tourist Police officer who took part in the rescue operation, told Arab News there were 27 passengers in the bus and five in the car it collided with.
“All dead bodies and injured have been shifted to Chilas Hospital. Only one child is missing,” the policeman said. “Among the 13 from Gilgit-Baltistan who died, three were women.”
An emergency was imposed at the District Headquarter Hospital Chilas.
“All doctors and paramedical staffs are on duty,” Dr. Mubashir Hassan, Health Director for Diamer Division, told Arab News on Wednesday morning from the emergency ward at the Chilas hospital.
“We will try our level best to provide all facilities for them and with all possible resources.”
