16 injured in accident near Lowari tunnel
CHITRAL: At least 16 people were slightly injured when a vehicle they were travelling in met with an accident while crossing a small tunnel in Lowari area on Thursday evening.
The passengers, including eight women and four children, were travelling to Chitral from Dir in a Datsun (Al-9343) when it overturned due to speeding.
The injured were shifted to Dir where doctors said they were out of danger. Some of them were identified as driver Wilayat Khan, Aslam Khan, son of Mandal Khan, Salim Khan, son of Muneer, and Saeed Hakim.
This accident would not have occurred if the tunnel was open 24 hrs. Now , when vehicles are held up for hours and then let go inside together, they try to speed up in excitement and fear of being held held again. Now this should not give an excuse to the tunnel managers to restrict movement in the tunnel, because ever since the tunnel is being used there are only 3 or 4 accidents inside the tunnel while accidents outside the tunnel occur almost daily.
Very disturbing that we can hear accidents now and then around tunnel this is because of poor planning in the construction of the approach roads on both sides. Especially on Chitral side it shows the planners never thought that snow fall occures in winter. These are vary dangerous and shows poor road engineering.