Sambalpur/Angul: Three truck drivers tragically lost their lives in two separate road accidents in Odisha’s Sambalpur and Angul districts on Thursday night.
A head-on collision between two trucks on the Bargarh-Sambalpur National highway claimed the lives of both drivers. The crash occurred near Dharmashala Chhak under Attabira police limits. One truck bore a Maharashtra registration, while the other was from West Bengal. The vehicles were severely mangled in the collision, trapping the drivers inside the wreckage.
Local residents and police personnel rescued the occupants and rushed them to a nearby hospital for treatment. Ho
wever, both drivers succumbed to their injuries. “I woke up in the hospital and have no memory of last night. The driver Mohammed Ismail, who hails from Bihar, is dead,” helper of a truck told a local news channel,
The identity of the other deceased driver is not known.
In Angul, a tanker driver was killed when his vehicle overturned and burst into flames at Balipasi ghat on National Highway 149 under Khamar police limits. Sources indicate that the driver lost control over the tanker possibly while navigating a sharp bend on the ghat section. Other truck drivers traveling on the highway spotted the blaze and informed police, as the driver, believed to have fallen unconscious in the crash, remained trapped inside the burning vehicle. By the time fire services teams doused the fire, the tanker was destroyed and the charred body of the driver was recovered, which has been sent for postmortem. Khamar police have initiated contact with the tanker’s owner to ascertain the driver’s identity and further investigation is underway.