Muscat: Two people were killed and 35 injured when a bus crashed into a truck in central Oman on Friday morning, Royal Oman Police (ROP), reported.
Both the vehicle drivers, an Indian and a Pakistani, were killed instantly. Nine of the bus passengers sustained serious injuries, while the rest suffered medium to light injuries.
The bus was carrying passengers from the capital Muscat to Salalah, southern part of Oman, when the accident occurred in Haima province, according to the officials of Salalah Line Transport Company, which operates the service. The bus was expected to reach Salalah by 11am.
An official at the ROP, told Gulf News that the injured passengers were airlifted by the ROP aviation to Nizwa Hospital. “Investigation is underway to know the reason behind the crash,” said the official, without giving further details.
Sources at Nizwa Hospital told Gulf News that they issued an urgent appeal for blood donations due to the high number of injuries.
Last year in March, a Dubai-bound bus was hit by a truck travelling through western Oman’s desert and a passing car later slammed into the wreckage, killing at least 18 people and injuring 16 others. Investigation revealed that the driver of the truck lost control after a tyre burst. The truck skidded off across the road and rammed into a bus, owned by the Gulf Transport Company, heading to Dubai from Salalah and carrying 45 passengers.
Figures from the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI) show that 692 people were killed in road accidents in 2016, compared to 975 in 2015.
Speeding and wrong overtaking have been cited as the main causes of road accidents in the country.
