JEDDAH, 12 January — Six female teachers and a Saudi driver perished on Laith Road on Wednesday when their car collided with a large truck, Al-Bilad newspaper reported yesterday. After the driver had dozed off, the truck drifted across the road and collided head-on with the car, the paper said.
The teachers were traveling from Makkah to their school in Laith. The paper identified the teachers as: Amal Samran Al-Tayyebi, Hala Nuwar Al-Maqati, Noora Hamoud Al-Daajani, Abeer Maatouk Al-Hatershi, Areej Salman Al-Yanbaawi, and Fowziya Al-Quthami. The dead driver was Mohsen Mezbin Al-Oteibi.
"Security officers took the bodies to the nearby hospital to complete the necessary procedures and arrested the truck driver," the paper said. Lt. Col. Faisal Al-Mahmadi, head of the Accidents Division, confirmed that the driver of the truck was exhausted and fell asleep, causing the accident.
Al-Mahmadi advised the public not to drive their vehicles when they are tired or not well. The families of the deceased teachers expressed their deep sorrow over the death of their loved ones. They said many accidents had occurred on Laith Road, killings hundreds of people.
Some relatives of the teachers complained that the authorities of King Abdul Aziz Hospital in Zahir had refused to take the seven bodies to the graveyard on its ambulance. According to Okaz newspaper, the relatives had to call for a civil defense vehicle to transport the bodies after waiting two and a half hours at the hospital. Hamoud Al-Daajani and Ewad Al-Otaibi urged an inquiry into the hospital's unsympathetic procedures in dealing with the case.
Drug trafficker held: Owaiqela police arrested a drug trafficker after his Maxima car was involved in an accident, Al-Riyadh newspaper, reported. The man had hidden five kilograms of hashish inside the car. Lt. Col. Hindi Muhammad Al-Shamrani, Owailqela police director, who had earlier worked in the drug combating department, had doubts about the driver from his unusual behavior. As a result, Shamrani ordered a thorough inspection of the car and found a considerable quantity of hashish hidden under within the car's rear end bodywork.
Father and daughter die: In another appalling accident in Turaif, the head of a Saudi family and his daughter died while his wife sustained serious injuries when their Mercedes car rammed into a trailer. The accident took place 30 kms east of Turaif. The man's wife was immediately taken to the intensive care unit of Turaif Hospital, Al-Jazirah reported.
Meanwhile, patrol police in Unaizah held a number of people and seized their five pickup trucks when they tried to transport plants and trees without permission. In Baha, an Indian expatriate worker committed suicide by hanging himself inside his company apartment. Security officers have launched an investigation into the incident. According to Al-Madinah newspaper, a Saudi youth who had shot himself in the head last week in a suicide attempt, died on Wednesday at a private hospital in Jeddah.
Al-Madinah also reported that an Indonesian housemaid jumped from the top of residential apartment in Makkah's Azizia district under suspicious circumstances. She has been admitted to Al-Noor Hospital with serious injuries.
