SUV crammed with 25 people gets hit by truck, 13 dead and several injured
In an extremely unfortunate incident which once again underlines the need to drive safe and to not pack more occupants than a vehicle would allow for, an SUV with as many as 25 people was hit by a truck in the US state of California recently. Such was the impact of the collision that the Ford Expedition SUV was left shockingly disfigured and as many as 13 people lost their lives.
According to reports, the accident took place on a highway near Holtville in California, around 200 kilometres from San Diego. While the exact cause that led to the accident is still a matter of investigation, police officials have been quoted as saying that most of the deceased are Mexicans and that 12 people may have died immediately upon impact.
Law enforcement officials have also reportedly said that when a team of first responders reached the site of the accident, they found many of the occupants trying to crawl out of the vehicle.
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Ford Expedition is a sufficiently large vehicle that is capable of seating up to eight people. How 25 people managed to get inside it is as yet unclear. Police officials suspect that these occupants were perhaps being illegally smuggled into the US although the vehicle was not being pursued by any border patrol agency at the time of the crash.
Reports suggest that the accident took place around 0600 hours and that it was sunny and that visibility was clear at the time. The SUV may have made its way onto the main highway before being hit by the truck although details like if the car jumped a signal and the speed of the truck are matters of investigation.
While there may be one or several factors that led to this sorry accident, it is amply clear that overloading a passenger vehicle with more occupants than what space permits inside is a bad idea which can also have tragic consequ
