POBNEWS24, Dhaka, Jan 8, 2022: At least 21 tourists have died after getting stuck in their cars while watching snowfall in northern Pakistan. Authorities say hundreds of thousands of tourists have flocked to the Murray area, 64 kilometers northeast of the capital Islamabad, to witness the snowfall that began last Tuesday. There, under freezing temperatures, about a thousand cars got stuck in the ice. Authorities confirmed that the 21 tourists were killed when they got stuck in a car.
In a video message, Pakistan’s Home Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said that in the last 15 to 20 years, not so many tourists have gone there together. About a thousand vehicles are stuck in the snow at that hill station. We estimate that at least 21 people died in the incident.
Meanwhile, the local administration has launched a rescue operation. The army and paramilitary have been called in to co-operate with them, the home minister said. All tourist routes to the area have been closed since Friday and no new tourists have been allowed to enter.
Expressing grief over the tragic deaths of tourists, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan tweeted that the matter was being closely monitored. An investigation has been launched into how such a tragic accident happened. Information Minister Fawad Chowdhury has requested no new tourists to visit the area.
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Snowfall in that part of Pakistan started from last Tuesday. People go there with their families to see the beautiful scenery. In this way, the area once became populated. Many could not even reach the hill station, the crowd was stuck on the road.
According to local media, people came to the area with at least one lakh vehicles to watch the snowfall. A video shared on social media shows the entire family, including the child, lying dead inside the car. And their car is covered with ice.
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Explaining the cause of death, the head of the Department of Infectious Diseases at the University of Maryland. Fahim Yunus said they could die from cold or carbon monoxide poisoning. Carbon monoxide is odorless and deadly. If the car is covered with ice, its silencer will get stuck. In this case, the passenger can easily die due to inhalation of carbon monoxide.
However, the Pakistani emergency services have not yet commented on the incident.
Sources: The Peninsula, BBC, The Francisco Chronicle
