Highway tyre burst leaves 5 Indians dead in road crash

Five Indians died in a road accident in the Taif-Riyadh Express Highway, Saudi Arabia early on Sunday morning. Two others were seriously injured.

According to relatives, the accident occurred in Riduan, 150 kms from Taif, Saudi Arabia. Two of the accident victims are active members of Kerala Muslim Cultural Center, a socio-cultural organization representing overseas Kerala Muslims.

The bizarre accident killing five people comes just a month after four Indian family members, father, mother and grandchildren (including an infant) died and three others were injured in a major road crash in Muzamiya near Riyadh when seven members of the family, from Kedhakar, Uppala district of Kerala, were returning after performing Umrah.

Among Sunday's dead were four catering company employees along with a friend who was living in their camp, and who was travelling with them when the Nissan van overturned several times after the front tyre burst and the driver lost control of the vehicle. The workers were employed by Sad Usman Catering Company that was serving food to a Korean Company. The vehicle was heading to the Madeen gold mine, according to the accident survivor, Jafsheer.

The deceased are identified as Chandrachat Mohammed Nawas (26) from Tirur Payyanangadi and his relative Chandrachat Noushad (26), Sridharan, 35 from Kalpakamchery, Mohammed Saleem, 32, Janardanan, 45 from Tirur. Nawas was driving the vehicle when the accident took place.

Two other employees of the catering company, Jafsheer (24) from Tirur, Malappuram and Mulayim Khan from Bangladesh are undergoing treatment at the Abdul Aziz Hospital in Taif.

The five dead bodies are kept in a hospital morgue and will be buried in Saudi Arabia, according to family members of the victims. A number of friends and relatives of the deceased are mourning their death that sent shock waves across the Keralite community in the Gulf.

All the five victims and one injured victim of the road accident hail from the Malappuram district of Kerala, home to large number of Keralites in the Gulf region.

According to reports from Malappuram, and Saudi Arabia, the accident happened at around 2.30am.

An Arab News report said quoting a study by Hany Hassan, Assistant Professor of Transportation Engineering at King Saud University, that there were 600,000 crashes recorded in the Kingdom in 2012, leading to death of around 7,638 people. The report projects about 4 million road accidents by 2030, unless strict measures are taking against aggressive driving, and strict traffic safety rules are implemented.

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