Four people were killed and another five injured in Phnom Penh’s Pur Senchey district on Sunday after a small crash between two motorbikes set off a series of accidents involving a container truck, a pickup truck and an SUV, police said Monday.
The crashes began when the two motorbikes, traveling in opposite directions, slammed into each other on National Road 4 near the Khmer Rouge tribunal at about 6:30 p.m., leading both drivers to sustain minor injuries, according to Seng Chanthon, chief of the municipal traffic police’s accident-measurement section.
“Then, a few minutes after the motorbikes crashed, the long vehicle [container truck] was driving very fast and happened to see the accident in front,” Mr. Chanthon said, adding that the truck swerved into a Toyota RAV4 SUV.
“The long vehicle tried to avoid hitting the crashed motorbikes by turning onto the other side [of the road]. As the long vehicle was trying to escape to the other side, it hit another car going in the opposite direction,” he said.
“The long vehicle hit a RAV4. The driver of the RAV4 died, and the passenger in the other front seat of the RAV4 died,” he continued. “Two other passengers were injured.”
The section chief said a further two people riding on another motorbike then slammed into the back of the Toyota before a pickup truck then slammed into them.
“The people on the motorbike were seriously injured, and when they got to the hospital, it was pronounced by the hospital that both of them had died,” he said.
Mr. Chanthon said the driver of the container truck who swerved out of his lane fled the scene, and that five people who survived the various crashes were sent to hospitals in Phnom Penh for treatment.
