Elderly Chinese pilgrims killed as overloaded truck tumbles off mountain road
- Driver ‘meant well’ in offering lift, says relative of victim
- Traffic inspectors are investigating what they say was ‘illegal ride’
Twelve elderly people were killed and 11 injured after their truck overturned on a mountain road in eastern China on Sunday.
The vehicle was overloaded with pilgrims in Wenling, Zhejiang province, on their way home from a temple visit, Thepaper.cn reported.
The driver, who was not identified and among the injured, offered 22 pilgrims a lift but lost control of the vehicle halfway down a hill.
The truck rolled over and fell three metres (10 feet) downhill. Eight passengers died at the scene, the report said. Four succumbed to their injuries in hospital and the rest were being treated for their injuries.
The oldest passengers were in their 80s, and the youngest in their 60s, the report said.
The driver – who suffered a broken leg – was treated in hospital and questioned by authorities.
“The driver meant well. He offered to give them a ride as those elders walked down the hill,” a relative of one of the victims was quoted as saying. “There were too many people [on board the truck].”
Heavy smog leaves elderly couple lost and wandering Chinese city of Nanjing for 9 hours
The traffic management bureau of the Ministry of Public Security sent a task force to look into what it described as an “illegal ride”, its news feed on social network Weibo said on Sunday night.
In May last year, a porter who sat in the back of a cargo truck was killed after he and his box of goods fell onto the road during a journey in Zhongshan, Guangdong province. The man chose to sit there to make unloading his cargo easier, the Yangcheng Evening News reported.
The driver did not notice the passenger was gone until he arrived at his destination.
