Seventeen people, including five women and 10 children, were killed when their truck fell into the river near Kalam in the Swat Valley in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
Seven others were also injured in the accident.
A local police official Shakeel Khan confirmed the death toll and said that the injured had been taken to a local hospital. All of the deceased belonged to the same family, according to the police. “The injured included three men, as many women and a child,” said Khan.
Rescue teams are working to salvage the wreckage of the truck from the Swat River.
“We don’t know any reason for the accident at the moment. It may have been caused because driver slept while driving,” Mehmood Aslam, a senior administration official in Swat told reporters.
Fatal traffic accidents, blamed on poor roads, badly maintained vehicles and reckless driving are frequent in Pakistan claim many lives annually.
