Six killed, 10 injured in lorry-van crash

Sandasen Marasinghe

*Four children among dead

* Injured admitted to hospital

Six people were killed and 10 others injured in a lorry-van collision near the Deduru Oya bridge along the Kurunegala-Dambulla main road yesterday. Among the dead were a young couple and their only child and three children aged two, four and six. The accident took place around 2.20 a.m. Ten people injured were admitted to the Kurunegala Hospital.

Police Spokesman SP Prishantha Jayakody told the Daily News that three injured persons were transferred to the Colombo National Hospital while another was transferred to the Kandy Hospital.

The victims were residents of Werambalanda, Sandagala and Uhumeeya in the Weerambugedara Police Division. According to the police the lorry on its way to Batticaloa with a fertilizer had collided head on with the van returning from Jaffna.

The people in the van had gone on a three day trip to Jaffna. Investigations are on to find the cause of the accident. The van driver S.M. Ranjith Rupasinghe is hospitalized and is not in a condition to make a statement.

Police arrested the lorry driver and was to be produced before the Kurunegala Magistrate.

The victims were identified as Indrani Kumari (2), Pasindu Dilshan Kumara (6), M.D. Agnus (70) and Thilak Susantha (23), his wife Saumya Indrani(22) and their child Malsha Mihindu Manahara (4).

Postmortems on the deceased were held at the Kurunegala Hospital yesterday .

Kurunegala Police traffic OIC IP Kirinda is conducting investigation on the instructions of Kurunegala Police HQI Ajith Wasantha, SP Gamini Gunathilake under the guidance of DIG Jagath Abeysiri Gunawardene. Kurunegala Hospital post OIC IP Namal Wijeratne assisted in the investigation.