At approximately 06h26 this morning, Friday 29 June 2007, Netcare 911 responded to a report of a very serious collision on Christiaan de Wet road close to the Hendrick Potgieter crossing alongside the Makro in Strubensvallei, Roodepoort.
Paramedics arrived on scene to find that four vehicles had collided and had to attend to two incidents about 150 meters apart. Initially a bakkie and a minibus collided and the minibus overturned as a result of the impact. The collision occurred in front of a lady driver in a blue Honda who swerved to avoid the collision- it appears that she then lost control of the car and it skidded across the middle island and was ” T-boned” on the passenger side by a silver Toyota Tazz travelling in the opposite direction.
There was massive damage to the Honda and it overturned as a result of the impact and landed on its roof, it appears that the driver died on impact, the lady was 35 years old. The lady driver of the Toyota was very seriously injured and was entrapped in the wreckage.She had a chest injury and a fracture to her lower leg. She was cared for by Netcare 911 paramedics while fire fighters used the “jaws of life” to free her from the wreck. Paramedics administered pain medication to try make the whole scenario more bearable for her.
There were 16 people in the taxi when it overturned. Three of the victims, including the driver, were entrapped between the front seats and the dashboard and they were all lying on top of each other. A separate rescue team stabilised the taxi and the used the “jaws of life” to remove the roof and used hydraulic rams to ease the crushed metal apart to free the victims. It appears that two of the front passengers had fractures their upper legs and one had a fractured pelvis as well. Paramedics administered medication to ease the pain of these three victims.
Ambulances from Netcare911 and the provincial ambulance service transported 17 patients to the Flora Clinic, Helen Joseph and Laratong hospitals.
In total 19 people were involved in the collision; 1 driver died at the scene, 4 victims were very seriously injured (critical but stable), 4 had serious injuries and 9 had relatively minor injuries. The driver of the bakkie escaped unharmed and remained on scene to give a statement to the police.
Christiaan de Wet road was closed between Hendrick Potgieter and Kitaar road, a distance of about 2 km, for nearly three hours during the heavy morning traffic resulting in delays on Hendrick Potgieter while rescuers attended to the scene and the Metro Polices specialist Accident Investigation Unit investigated the scene.
This scene was attended to by Netcare 911, Provincial fire and ambulance services and the Metro police.
Please feel free to contact if you require higher quality pictures for publishing purposes. Information provided by Netcare 911 to the Arrive Alive Road Safety Website.
NETCARE 911
Emergency No. 082 911
Road Safety & Arrive Alive Blog 