KAMPALA, Uganda, Oct 22, (AP): Two buses and two other vehicles crashed early Wednesday on a highway in western Uganda, killing at least 63 people, police said, in one of the worst motor accidents in the East African country in recent years. Several other people were injured in the crash that happened after midnight local time on the highway to Gulu, a major city in northern Uganda.

Two bus drivers going in opposite directions attempted to overtake other vehicles and collided near the town of Kiryandongo, according to police. "In the process, both buses met head-on during the overtaking maneuvers,” the police statement said. Fatal road crashes are common in Uganda and elsewhere in East Africa, where roads are often narrow.

Police usually blame such accidents on speeding drivers. In August, a bus carrying mourners back home from a funeral in southwestern Kenya overturned and plunged into a ditch, killing at least 25 people and injuring several others. The death toll in the latest crash in Uganda is uncommonly high, said Irene Nakasiita, a Red Cross spokeswoman who described victims left bleeding with broken limbs.

She said the images from the scene were too gruesome to share. "The magnitude of this incident is so big,” Nakasiita said. While accident victims can expect to get help from onlookers and other first responders who rush to crash sites, "at night even bystanders are not there,” she said. Most of the injured people are receiving treatment at a government hospital nearby.

In Uganda, 5,144 people were killed in road crashes in 2024. That number rose from 4,806 in 2023 and 4,534 in 2022, according to official police figures, which show a worrisome rise in the total number of those killed or injured in road crashes in recent years. Careless overtaking and speeding accounted for 44.5% of all crashes documented in 2024, the police's latest crime report said. "As investigations continue, we strongly urge all motorists to exercise maximum caution on the roads, especially avoiding dangerous and careless overtaking, which remains one of the leading causes of crashes in the country,” the police said in their statement after the latest crash.