JEDDAH, 20 April 2005 — Traffic came to a standstill on the busy Makkah-Madinah Expressway for more than an hour on Monday night after a speeding truck jumped the lane and crashed into a number of vehicles, injuring seven people, five of them critically.
Police said the truck driver lost control as the road was slippery following a drizzle in the afternoon.
Witnesses said the huge truck traveling north hit two cars — a Buick and a Suzuki jeep — between the Briman and Airport exits, then skidded to the opposite lane and hit a Toyota Camry.
Fire Department personnel pulled out three injured men who were trapped inside their cars. “When we arrived at the accident scene, passersby had already pulled out four of the injured,” one official said.
Fawaz Al-Harbi, 23, who was at the scene said, “It was a horrible accident, blood was everywhere. Passengers in the Suzuki and Buick sustained serious injuries.”
The injured were rushed to nearby hospitals. Both the truck driver and the Camry driver escaped without injury, said a rescue worker.
Hundreds of onlookers gathered at the scene making the rescue effort difficult, one police officer said.
