Dr. Sherif Makeen, a health ministry official in Egypt has confirmed that three children were among the 21 who died in Nile River.
According to AFP, a bus fell into a canal in Egypt’s Nile River Delta region on Saturday, 12 November, killing at least 21 people, the country’s Health Ministry said.
In a statement, the ministry said the accident happened in Dakahlia province, around 100 kilometers (62 miles) northeast of the capital of Cairo. Other injured passengers were transported to a local hospital.
The head of police investigations in the province, Brig. Mohamed Abdel Hadi, said the driver may have lost control of the vehicle’s steering wheel.
The Public Prosecution office which is investigating the incident, accused the minibus driver of making a phone call when driving.
He was arrested and preliminary tests allegedly revealed that he was under the influence of drugs, according to a judiciary source.
Citing figures from the the Central Agency for Public Mobilisation and Statistics, state media Ahram reported that while traffic injuries across Egypt dropped last year, traffic deaths increased by 15.2 percent.
Deadly traffic accidents claim thousands of lives every year in Egypt, which has a poor transportation safety record. Crashes and collisions are mostly caused by speeding, bad roads or poor enforcement of traffic laws.
In July, a passenger bus slammed into a parked trailer truck on a highway in the southern province of Minya, killing 23 people and injuring 30.
In October, a truck slammed into a minibus in Dakahlia, killing at least 10 people, authorities said.