KARACHI, Jan 16: Five passenger died and 19 others were injured, some of them critically, when a passenger coach and an NLC trailer collided head on at Hasan Square at 6:30 Thursday morning.

The trailer driver was also injured.

The dead have been identified as Abdullah, Mairaj Gul, Pervaiz Masih, Asif Masih, and Shamon Masih.

Police said that Mairaj Gul was an ASF employee. He was later shifted to the PNS Shifa where he died.

Pervaiz, Asif and Shamon were the last three passengers to board the coach at Essa Nagri. They were sweepers and were going to work at the airport.

Police said that Asif Masih, aged 22, had two sons, and Pervaiz, aged 46, six children.

Some of the injured have been identified as Alamgir, Khair Amin, Sajjad, Jalaldin, Fida Mohammed, Mohammed Akbar, Ali Mohammed, Mohammed Rehan, and Mohammed Asif.

“Both the vehicles were running at high speed because of the empty road,” said one of the injured, Alamgir, at Jinnah Post-graduate Medical Centre (JPMC).

The collision was so intense that parts of the passenger coach, Al-Misri coach (PE-1237), had to be cut in order to get the injured passengers out of the twisted vehicle.

Edhi volunteers said that three of the injured persons died on the spot as it took time to take the injured and other passengers out of the smashed coach.

The injured were rushed to the JPMC and a nearby private hospital. Two of the injured later died.

The town police officer Gulshan Town told Dawn that the accident, which took place at 6:30am, was almost a head-on collision as the passenger coach was coming from the direction of Sir Shah Sulaiman Road and the NLC trailer (NLC-88-2138) from the Nipa side on University Road.

He said that 2-3 of the injured persons are in a critical condition.

The NLC trailer driver, identified as Mohammed Akram, was also injured in the accident. He has been admitted to the JPMC.

A senior police officer said that none of the two drivers bothered to slow down their vehicles at the main intersection of Hasan Square.

After midnight traffic signals at all the major traffic intersections in the city were switched off and there remained only an orange light flickering which also caused accidents, said relations of an injured man.

Those living at Hasan Square said lately there had been a considerable increase in the movement of NLC trailers on the main University Road even during rush hours, posing a grave danger to motorists and pedestrians.

The accident led to a serious traffic jam at Hasan Square as rescue work and clearing of wreckage took several hours.

Reckless driving claimed another two lives.

An unidentified woman, aged 60, was run over by a speeding taxi in FB Area.

A cyclist was knocked down by a speeding taxi in Korangi No 6.