Highway bus collision kills 21 in Comilla

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At least 21 people were killed and 24 injured as two passenger buses collided head-on on Dhaka-Chittagong Highway in Daudkandi, Comilla yesterday morning.

Witnesses said a Dhaka-bound bus of Starline Express from Feni collided head-on with a Comilla-bound bus from Homna in Daulatpur around 9:15am, reports a correspondent from Comilla.

Eighteen passengers including three women of Starline died on the spot as the bus fell into a roadside ditch due to the impact. The driver and helper of the other bus were also killed, but their identity could not be known immediately.

Firefighters and police from Comilla and forces from highway police rushed to the spot and pulled the bus from the ditch.

“Several passengers were trapped inside the bus with their hands and legs broken,” said a witness on the spot.

The injured were immediately taken to different hospitals and clinics in Comilla and Feni.

The critically injured were later shifted to Dhaka Medical College Hospital. They are Samia, 6, daughter of Salma Begum who was killed in the accident, two-and-a-half year-old Abdus Samad, Yusuf of Muradnagar, and Ferdousi, 35, Mukti, 10, of Korikandi village in Titas upazila.

Hearing the news, relatives of the passengers rushed to the scene, creating traffic congestion on the highway for about four hours.

The bodies of the victims were kept at the office of Eliatganj Highway Police. Eleven of them were identified till yesterday evening. They are Nasiruddin, 42, his sister Salma Begum, 35, of Purba Devpur in Chhagalnaiya, Habibur Rahman, 60, of Langalkot, Shadhan Mahbub, 55, of Fulgazi, Starline driver Nayan, 45, of Chhagalnaiya, Abdul Mannan, 19, of South Sotero in Chhagalnaiya, Akbar Hossain, 30, cloth trader Alam, 38, Abul Kashem, 42, Zahir, 30, and Reaz, 32, of Feni Sadar.

Comilla Deputy Commissioner Monjurur Rahman, Superintendent of Police Imtiaz Ahmed and other senior officials visited the spot.

This was the major accident since 41 people were burned to death as a passenger bus caught fire on the same highway in Suaganj in January 2007.

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