16 dead, 12 injured in road accident in Iran’s Kurdistan province

SANANDAJ, Iran - Sixteen people were killed and 12 injured on Thursday morning when a passenger bus fell down a hillside on a mountainous route in Iran’s Kurdistan province.

“Around 12:00 pm on Thursday, Kurdistan’s emergency was called about a traffic accident near Palngan village in Kamyaran,” Kurdistan province’s emergency directorate told Rudaw English.

A passenger bus carrying villagers from Mariwan’s Pirsafa were traveling to visit a shrine when the accident occurred on the road between Mariwan and Kamyaran.

“Around 28 people from Pirsafa village took to the road to visit Owais shrine in Kamyaran. Their bus fell from the heights near Palngan. The whole village is now worried and have gone to the place of the incident,” said Osman Ahmedi, a resident of Pirsafa.

Owais al-Qarani is believed to have lived during the era of the Prophet Mohammed. The shrine is an important and holy Sunni site visited by many people from all over Iran, especially from the Kurdish-majority northwest.

Images of the accident scene show the crushed, overturned bus on a rocky mountainside. The driver lost control of the bus, IRNA reported.

Nine ambulances and a helicopter were dispatched to the crash site. Sixteen people have been confirmed dead and 12 are injured were transferred to Kamyaran and Sanandaj hospitals.

Iran has one of the world’s most dismal records for traffic safety and the Mariwan-Kamyaran road is rated one of the worst in Kurdistan province, according to IRNA.

16 dead, 12 injured in road accident in Iran’s Kurdistan province

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