By Amaechi Agbo

Tragedy struck the Abia State University, (ABSU) Uturu, when three students of Medicine and Surgery Department died in a crash in the Okigwe axis of the Enugu-Umuahia Expressway.

The medical students, it was gathered, were returning to Aba from the school’s induction when the incident occurred. The deceased, two 500-level and one 400-level medical students were heading for their base in Aba when the tragic incident occurred at the Nunya axis of the Enugu Port Harcourt Expressway on Thursday evening, March 21.

Confirming the incident, the Abia State Sector Commander of the Federal Road Safety Corps, Fredrick Ogiden, said officers of the corps arrived at the scene shortly after the accident, which he said involved an ash-coloured Toyota Camry.

Some other persons were injured in the crash.

In a video circulating online, officers of the FRSC were seen at the scene of the incident while another video showed two injured persons and the corpse of a female victim in a hospital.

According to The Punch, a source said six medical students were returning from Uturu when the accident happened. “Three students have been confirmed dead, while two others are injured and are battling for their lives now in the hospital while one miraculously survived.”

The Abia state Commissioner for Health, Dr Ngozi Okoronkwo, said the ABSU students were reportedly driving a Toyota Camry when a tyre burst. Okoronkwo added that she was told that the driver probably lost control and hit a tree by the roadside.

The Abia State University inducted a total of 129 (One Hundred and Twenty-Nine) new Medical Doctors, at the 30th Induction/ Swearing in ceremony of graduating Medical Doctors of the Institution.