Express bus ploughs into 7 vehicles in Johor

Police say bus driver has no previous records or summonses and tested negative for drugs.

JOHOR BAHRU: Seven vehicles were badly damaged when an express bus ploughed into them at Km45.3 of Jalan Batu Pahat-Mersing in Sri Lalang, near Kluang yesterday.

Kluang police chief ACP Mohamad Laham said the incident occurred on a congested route in front of the district’s Road Transport Department (RTD) at about 12.45pm. No casualties were reported.

“The accident occurred when the 45-year-old bus driver who was on the way to Kluang from Ayer Hitam, Batu Pahat, lost control of his vehicle and hit a tree on the left side of the road before skidding to the right and colliding into a Honda car coming from Kluang,” he said in a statement here yesterday.

According to Mohamad, the express bus which was not carrying any passengers then crashed into five other cars – three Perodua Kancils, a Mitsubishi Triton and a Toyota – as well as a Yamaha motorcycle owned by a district RTD staff that was parked at the department’s building.

He said initial investigations revealed that the bus driver had no previous records or summonses and tested negative for drugs. The bus, too, had no summonses and the road tax was still valid. -FMT