Chitradurga, Agency. Nine people were killed when a speeding truck collided with a luxury sleeper bus in Karnataka’s Chitradurga district late Wednesday night.
A senior police officer gave this information. A speeding container truck hit a private luxury sleeper bus near Hiriyur around 2 am on Wednesday, causing the bus to catch fire and at least nine people killed, a senior police officer said. East Zone Inspector General of Police Ravikant Gowda said that there were 32 passengers in the bus going to Gokarna and after colliding with the truck, the bus burst into flames in which nine people died, most of them were burnt alive inside the vehicle. Gowda told reporters that a truck crossed the divider and collided with the bus coming from the front, following which the bus caught fire. The bus driver and the passenger survived in this accident, but the truck driver died.
“Our initial investigation indicates that the vehicle that hit the bus could have been a diesel tanker,” Gowda said. He told that many passengers saved their lives by jumping from the bus. He said, our preliminary investigation shows that eight passengers and the truck driver have died. Of the 12 injured, nine have been taken to Sira and three to Tumkuru. A person with serious burns has been admitted to Victoria Hospital in Bengaluru. The IGP also informed that the remaining injured are out of danger. Another bus going from Dasarahalli to Dandeli was also behind this bus, but it narrowly escaped the accident. There were 45 school children in this bus. The driver of the bus carrying school children hit the accident-hit bus from behind, then turned to the other side and went off the road, Gowda said. It is a matter of relief that no one aboard this bus was injured. He said that the children have been sent ahead by another bus and the driver of the school bus is the main eyewitness to the accident, whose statement will be recorded. He said that most of the passengers of the bus that met with the accident had booked tickets online. “We have got their phone numbers and are trying to contact their families,” the police officer said. The officer said that the dead will be identified through DNA testing.
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