Nine
persons were yesterday confirmed dead and 19 others seriously injured
after two commercial vehicles collided yesterday along Maiduguri-Kano
road.
According to officials of the Federal Road Safety
Commission (FRSC), the accident occurred after one of the buses got a
tyre burst that forced it to swerve into the opposite lane where it ran
into an oncoming vehicle.
Eyewitnesses said nine of the passengers in the two
buses died on the spot, while 19 others who sustained clinical injuries
were rushed, by FRSC rescue team, to Maiduguri University Teaching
Hospital about 60km away.
FRSC, Operations Officer, Amos Thiza, who issued a
text message to journalists at about 4:30pm, said, “the accident
occurred at about 9am today (Tuesday) near Benishiekh on the
Maiduguri-Damaturu road, where two commercial buses crashed, as a result
of tyre burst by the vehicle with registration number, LG 09 MFA, which
ran into the other bus marked XA 519 GUB.”
The passengers in the two buses, according to Thiza, were 33.
Similarly, four persons died in a ghastly auto crash
that occurred on Monday night, on Enugu-Onitsha expressway, in Ezeagu
local government area of Enugu state.
Also, 11 persons were injured in the accident that
involved a DAF Truck with registration No XA805 FUN and a Toyota Hiace
bus, with registration number, XZ 192 ENU, in a head-on.
The state Police Relation Officer, (PPRO), DSP Ebere Amaraizu, confirmed the incident when contacted on phone.
He said the dead bodies have been deposited at our
Saviour Hospital mortuary, while the eleven injured persons were rushed
to unity Hospital Ngwo for medical attention.
The South-east zonal commander of Federal Road Safety
Corps (FRSC), Mr. Chike Nwakama, described the auto crash as
“unfortunate.”
He called on the Chinese Construction Company (CCC
Ltd) handling the reconstruction of the road to speed up the work,
saying that 96 per cent of road crashes on the Enugu-Onitsha expressway
was caused by bad roads.
Is it possible that the construction company can be held liable for that particular accident? It is always a tragic ending when people loss lives in a car collision. We cannot pinpoint the exact reason why the bus tire exploded. Certainly, if it involves negligence then the other bus company or the victims could always resort into filing a lawsuit, a wrongful death maybe, and the injured passengers could file for personal injury claims though. Accident such as this is devastating and any legal support for the bereaving families could somehow help them out on bearing with the loss.
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