A deadly Saturday on the road in Turkey. HASAt least 34 people died and more than 60 others were injured in two accidents that occurred a few hours apart in the south-east of the country on Saturday August 20.
A first accident involved an ambulance as well as a coach. The tragedy caused the death of sixteen people and injured 21 on a highway in southeastern Turkey, announced the governor of Gaziantep province. The governor had previously mentioned a “accident involving a coach, a rescue team and an ambulance (…) on the highway between Gaziantep and Nizip”.
According to the Turkish news agency DHA, the ambulance, a fire truck and a vehicle belonging to a team of journalists – who had gone to the scene of an accident – were hit head-on by a coach traveling on the same motorway. Four rescuers, three firefighters and two journalists from the Turkish news agency Ilhas are among the 16 dead, according to local media. Images released by the DHA agency showed the rear of a partially shredded ambulance, as well as the coach involved in the accident, lying on its side and with the front ripped open.
A few hours later, 19 other people were killed and nearly 30 were injured some 250 km further east. The accident involved a heavy goods vehicle and several vehicles, according to Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca.
“16 people lost their lives and 29 others were injured, eight of them seriously, in the accident following the breakage of the brakes of a truck which hit a crowd in Derik”in the province of Mardin, said the minister on Twitter.
Videos broadcast by the Turkish press show a driver losing control of his truck, hitting several vehicles at full speed and pedestrians trying to flee. According to Turkey’s official Anadolu news agency, a traffic accident involving three vehicles had occurred at the same location shortly before, and rescue teams were on the scene when the truck drove into the crowd. Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag announced the opening of an investigation by Derik’s attorney general’s office into the double accident, according to Anadolu Agency.