Horror car pile-up kills 3, injures 347

At least three people have now died and 347 been injured after a devastating car pile up involving over 60 cars on the Abu Dhabi-Dubai highway on Tuesday morning, state news agency Wam said.

Abu Dhabi Police confirmed to ArabianBusiness.com on Wednesday afternoon that three people had been killed in the crash, and six remained in critical condition replacing an earlier WAM report stating a dozen people had died.

Police said 12 buses carrying some 300 workers in total were involved in the crash, which took place at 6.00 am (0200 GMT) on on the Dubai-bound side of Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Road.

Ninety-two cars caught fire in the smash-ups, Khalifa Al Darrai, chief executive of the Ambulance Service Centre in Dubai, told UAE weekly Xpress in an early report.

"Patients were lying on the road. Thankfully, they had abandoned their cars or else the death toll would have risen significantly," Al Darrai said.

Police said among the 347 injured, six people were critical, while 39 suffered medium injuries, UAE daily Gulf News reported.

UAE Interior Minister Lieutenant General Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan deeply regretted the traffic accidents, which he blamed on resulting bad weather and motorists' recklessness, leading to series of unprecedented collisions, Wam reported.

"Motorists should be careful when driving," said Sheikh Saif. "Delay in reaching a destination will be always better than a hurry that ends up in a tragic accident, which a driver or others suffer most."

Eyewitnesses at the scene said it was "mayhem".

"There is a car which is completely charred, that is all I can tell - I cannot tell the brand, or if it's one car or two. All I can is that it was once white, " said Rami Dia, a 31-year-old business development manager, speaking to ArabianBusiness.com from the scene.

"It's mayhem... I live in Egypt, which is the most dangerous place to drive in the world. This is the worst accident I've ever seen."

The accident scene, located approximately 60 kilometers outside the capital, is nearby the Al Ghantoot area.

Over 1,050 people were killed in UAE road accidents last year, compared to 868 deaths in 2006.

Recent figures released by the Ministry of Interior show that there were 6,813 accidents on UAE roads during 2007, resulting in 10,526 injuries.

According to government statistics, one person is injured on the UAE roads every two hours, with one fatality every fifteen hours.