At least three people were killed and several others injured after a private passenger bus collided head-on with a container truck and caught fire in Andhra Pradesh’s Nandyal district in the early hours of Thursday.
The accident took place between 1 am and 2 am near Shirivellametta village in Shirivella mandal. According to police, the private bus was travelling from Nellore to Hyderabad when its front right tyre burst. The sudden tyre failure caused the driver to lose control of the vehicle, cross the road divider and ram into an oncoming container truck.
The impact of the collision triggered a massive fire, quickly engulfing both vehicles. Due to the intensity of the flames, three people — the bus driver, the truck driver and the truck’s cleaner — were charred to death. Their bodies were later recovered from the burnt remains of the vehicles and shifted to a government hospital for post-mortem examinations.
At the time of the crash, the bus was carrying around 36 passengers. Panic broke out as the fire spread rapidly. Passengers initially struggled to escape as the bus doors and emergency exits reportedly did not open. Several people were forced to break windows or jump out to save themselves.
A driver of a passing DCM vehicle stopped after noticing the blaze and helped rescue passengers by breaking the bus windows. His timely intervention, along with assistance from locals, is believed to have prevented a higher death toll. Videos of the rescue efforts later surfaced on social media.
More than ten passengers suffered burn injuries, while others sustained injuries while escaping from the bus. The injured were rushed to the Government General Hospital in Nandyal, where doctors said most were in stable condition. A few passengers reportedly suffered fractures but were out of danger.
Police and fire services reached the spot soon after the incident and worked for several hours to douse the flames and remove the burnt vehicles. Traffic on the highway was affected for a considerable time before normal movement was restored.
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