“Eight passengers died on the spot,” a source told Arab News. One passenger died on the way to hospital while a third died after reaching there, he added.
“One of the injured is in critical condition,” the source said. The Syrian driver of the bus was injured. The bus was heading for Madinah from Makkah.
The injured Pakistanis were taken to three hospitals. Eleven men, four women and a child were admitted to Khulais Hospital. Two women and four men are in Rabigh Hospital, while three are in Hamna Hospital.
Civil Defense officers in Khulais had difficulty retrieving the bodies of passengers trapped inside the bus. Fourteen Red Crescent teams of nearby towns were involved in the rescue operation.
Last month four Umrah pilgrims died and 18 were injured in an accident on the Makkah-Madinah Expressway. "Civil Defense teams freed some passengers trapped inside the bus. The injured passengers were taken to Wadi Al-Fara Hospital. The bus overturned after hitting a metal fence some 135 km from Madinah," said Lt. Col. Talal Al-Harbi, spokesman for the Madinah Civil Defense.
A number of accidents have taken place in the Kingdom in recent months. Twenty-two people died and 17 were injured when a SAPTCO bus collided with a parked truck in Wadi Dawasir, about 400 km from Riyadh last month.
SAPTCO said the bus, traveling from Riyadh to the southwestern city of Khamis Mushayt, was carrying 15 Indians, eight Saudis, seven Pakistanis, four Bangladeshis, two Yemenis, two Syrians and one Egyptian. The bus caught fire, trapping many passengers inside.
