Two passengers were killed when a huge tree collapsed and crushed an angkot minivan in Medan, with two other passengers being treated in hospital for their injuries.
The incident occurred in front of the Haji Adam Malik General Hospital during a heavy storm in the North Sumatra capital yesterday. One tree collapsed and crushed a vacant car, before another fell and crushed an angkot minivan which had four hospital employees as passengers.
“The four victims were employees of Adam Malik Hospital, and two of them died,” the hospital’s spokeswoman Rosario Dorothy Simanjuntak said.
The two deceased victims were nurses at the hospital’s surgery department, who had just finished their shifts and were heading home. The injured victims are being treated at the hospital, and the extent of their injuries were not disclosed.
While city maintenance has not been explicitly blamed for this incident, overgrown and unmanaged trees in the middle of the city have claimed numerous victims throughout Indonesia, especially during the rainy season.
Despite many similar incidents in the past, few have learned to preemptively cut down overgrown trees or trim their bark before it’s too late.
