Twelve die in car collision in North Sumatra
Twelve die in car collision in North Sumatra
Apriadi Gunawan, The Jakarta Post, Medan, North Sumatra
Twelve people are dead and seven others were severely injured
after a passenger bus and a minivan collided in North Sumatra,
police said on Friday.
The crash, involving a Garuda bus and a minivan belonging to
CV Dirgantara, took place on Thursday on the trans-Sumatra
highway connecting Medan and Tebing Tinggi, some 46 kilometers
east of the provincial capital of Medan.
It was believed that the minivan was overloaded with
passengers and traveling at high speed.
Killed in the accident were the minivan's driver, Beni
Harianja, 23, who died instantly, and his 11 passengers. The dead
were identified as Zulkarnaen, 32, Taufik Hidayat, 32, Faisal,
25, Ari Antari, 3, Masiem, 35, Tasminas alias Galuh, 60, Asludin,
41, Maisarah, 42, Binsar Siregar, Apriliana, 4, and Beta
Sihombing. All were residents from Serdang Bedagai and Tebing
Tinggi.
The seven injured were in intensive care at Melati Hospital
and Trianda Hospital in Perbaungan. All five passengers on board
the bus survived the accident.
Police were searching for the bus driver who fled the scene
after the crash.
Deli Serdang Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Machfud Arifin said
the fatal collision could have been avoided if the minivan driver
had lowered his speed and had not overloaded his vehicle.
"Such a small vehicle with a capacity of only 14 passengers
was jammed with 21 people, so it became unstable," he said.
He said the driver failed to control the speeding minivan when
it clipped the back of the oncoming bus.
According to a witness Ani, 39, the minivan apparently lost
control near the Sei Jenggi village, Perbaungan in the Serdang
Bedagai regency when driving from the direction of Tebing Tinggi,
meeting the bus.
"Suddenly, the front of the minivan hit the back of the bus
and the driver lost control, the minivan rolling over three
times. Meanwhile, the Garuda bus hit a tree on the street side,"
she said.
Machfud said the police had recovered the vehicles as evidence
in their investigation.
"The accident is a lesson for all (minivan) drivers to always
check the stability of their vehicles." Drivers should be
focussed on protecting the lives of their passengers, not just on
making money, he said.
Sahril Irwansyah Rosa, a spokesman for CV Dirgantara, said his
company would compensate the families of those killed and injured
in the accident.
"We will coordinate with the shareholders of CV Dirgantara to
make donations to the victims' families," he said.
On Dec. 16, 2003, five people were killed and dozens of others
injured when a bus crashed into a tree in Situbondo regency, East
Java, after managing to avoid a collision with a minivan coming
from the opposite direction.
Two other crashes killed at least 14 people on Nov. 21 as
Indonesian Muslims were preparing to observe the Idul Fitri
holidays. Ten people were killed in a road accident in the East
Java district of Paiton, while the other four died in another
accident in South Lampung, Lampung province.
Last October, in Situbondo, 55 people were killed in a three-
vehicle pile-up when a trailer truck hit a bus on a steep slope
in the Banyu Glugur area and the bus was rammed from behind by a
minivan. The fuel tank of the truck burst into flames engulfing
all three vehicles.
Road accidents claim an average of 27 fatalities a day in
Indonesia. According to data collected by the National Police
Traffic Directorate, a total of 9,856 people died in 13,399 road
accidents last year.