Saudis injured in road crash while on rescue mission
Accident occurred as the duo rushed to help injured girl on road
Cairo: Two young Saudis were injured in a traffic accident while trying to save a girl who was wounded in an earlier road crash in Riyadh, a relative has said.
On leaving a coffee shop, Meshal Al Nafaei and his cousin Yassir saw a young girl writhing in pain after being hit by a car, Meshal’s brother, Fahd, told Al Arabiya.
The duo rushed to save the girl, but they were also injured due to a traffic accident, he added.
Both were hospitalised with serious injuries. They underwent surgeries in the head and stayed in the ICU for more than a month, Fahd said.
It is not clear when the reported accidents took place.
Meshal and his cousin are now undergoing rehabilitation at the Prince Sultan City for Rehabilitation in Riyadh.
In recent months, Saudi Arabia has seen a string of road accidents amid stepped-up efforts to reduce them.
Last month, four young men were killed and three others injured in a collision between their cars in the Muhayil governorate in south-western Saudi Arabia.
In November, a collision involving three cars killed eight people and critically injured five others on a road in south-western Saudi Arabia.
A month earlier, an expatriate was killed and four Saudis injured in a car collision in Saudi Arabia’s south-western city of Al Baha.
In September, a bus flipped over, leaving four people dead and seven others wounded in the coastal governorate of Al Wajh in north-western Saudi Arabia.
Some 4,555 people died as a result of traffic accidents in Saudi Arabia in 2022, according to official figures.
There were 16,962 serious road accidents in 2022, down 6.8 per cent against the previous year, the Saudi General Authority for Statistics said.
These accidents claimed 4,555 lives, with a 2.1 per cent drop compared to 2021.