Tokyo [Japan], December 27 (ANI): Amid heavy snowfall, a large-scale pileup involving greater than 50 autos on an expressway in Japan’s Gunma Prefecture has left at the very least two individuals useless and 26 others injured, Kyodo News reported.
The incident occurred on Friday night, round 7:30 pm (native time) on the outbound carriageway of the Kan-etsu Expressway in Minakami, northwest of Tokyo.
Police mentioned snowy circumstances turned the street floor icy, inflicting a number of autos to skid uncontrolled. This led to a chain-reaction crash spanning roughly 300 metres, in line with Kyodo News.
Officials mentioned the accident was triggered when a truck slammed into one other truck that had stopped following an earlier single-vehicle crash.
The influence escalated quickly, involving dozens of autos. At least 10 autos caught fireplace, and firefighters took greater than seven hours to carry the blaze below management.
Police confirmed {that a} 77-year-old lady from Tokyo, who was seated within the rear of a automotive pushed by her relations, was amongst these killed.
Another physique was recovered from the motive force’s seat of a giant truck.
Of the 26 injured, 5 have been reported to be in severe situation, whereas 21 sustained minor accidents, Kyodo News reported.
In the aftermath, a bit of the expressway was shut down as severely broken autos, some burned past recognition, remained strewn throughout the outbound lanes.
At the time of the crash, motorists had reportedly been suggested to limit their pace to 50 kilometres per hour as a result of snowfall.
Recounting the chaos, a truck driver in his 60s mentioned his car struck the median after he tried to keep away from a automotive forward.
He additionally mentioned he heard a number of blasts in the course of the collision. ‘The ice made it tough for me to regulate the steering wheel,’ he mentioned. ‘I feared for my life.’
Authorities had issued a heavy snow warning late Friday, coinciding with the beginning of the year-end and New Year holidays throughout Japan.
Officials mentioned the extreme snowfall performed a major position in triggering the accident, including that sections of the expressway remained closed for investigation and to clear the wreckage.
Meanwhile, a number of netizens expressed shock over the lethal pileup on the Kan-etsu Expressway, noting that Japan is broadly thought to be having a number of the most secure street networks on this planet. (ANI)