Bus crash kills 12

The wreckage of a microbus that collided head-on with a bus on the Dhaka-Sylhet highway yesterday.

At least 12 people were killed and 18 others injured in a head-on collision between a bus and a microbus on the Dhaka-Sylhet highway at Shibpur upazila in Narsingdi yesterday.

The accident occurred around 12:30pm in Chaitanya area when a Dhaka-bound bus of Haor Bilas Paribahan, taking the wrong side of the road, rammed the microbus carrying 13 passengers, police quoted witnesses as saying.

All the dead were microbus passengers while the injured were passengers of the bus.

The microbus passengers were going to the shrine of Hazrat Shahjalal (R) in Sylhet from their Mirpur home in Dhaka, police quoted family members as saying.

Ten of the deceased are microbus driver Faruk Hossain, 30, passengers Arif, 8, Safiullah, 65, Rafique, 40, Moyez Uddin, 42, Anik, 8, Ibrahim Miah, 70, Nannu Mia, 45, Masudur Rahman, 45, and Solaiman, 50.

Identity of two other deceased could not be known immediately.

Nazrul Islam, a sergeant of Narsingdi Highway Police, said ten of the microbus passengers died on the spot while two others succumbed to their injuries on the way to Narsingdi District Hospital and Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH).

Of the injured, 16 took treatment at local clinics and hospitals while two others were admitted to DMCH and Narsingdi District Hospital.

The condition of the lone surviving microbus passenger was critical, said the police official quoting doctors at Narsingdi District Hospital.

KM Firoz, officer-in-charge of Shibpur Police Station, told The Daily Star that the bodies were sent to Narsingdi Sadar Hospital morgue for autopsies.

Labour and Employment Minister Razi Uddin Ahmed Raju, Narsingdi Deputy Commissioner Obaidul Azam and Narsingdi Superintendent of Police Khandaker Mohid Uddin visited the injured at the district hospital

Source: The Daily Star