Monster truck accident kills 2, injures 18
AMSTERDAM — Two people were killed and 18 injured, six seriously, when a giant pick-up truck span out of control during a stunt show in the Dutch town of Haaksbergen on Sunday, local authorities said.
Earlier, local media had quoted the town’s mayor as saying that three people had died, including two children. The authorities gave no details of who had died.
The accident happened when the driver of a giant, 1,500 horsepower truck with tractor-sized wheels failed to brake after driving across a row of parked cars during a stunt and instead plowed into a group of onlookers.
“A so-called monster truck drove into a crowd of spectators. A terrible accident with two dead victims, 18 wounded (including) six severely wounded,” town authorities said on their website haaksbergen.nl.
The driver was arrested, local police said in a tweet.
An amateur video of the accident posted on Facebook showed the truck revving hard and then riding over six cars, before suddenly heading towards spectators lining the square, who were separated from the show by only flimsy metal barriers.
Screaming, some managed to scurry away, but others had no time to escape.
The injured were taken to hospitals in three nearby towns, while air ambulance helicopters from the entire region flew to the scene of the accident, including one from neighboring Germany, emergency services said.
