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Road deaths on the rise

Johannesburg - The death toll in reported road accidents countrywide since Sunday has reached 25.

In Mpumalanga, four people, one of them a baby, were killed when two vehicles collided on the R37 near Nelspruit on Monday.

The accident happened when one vehicle overtook another, said ER24 spokesperson Pieter Rossouw.

"When ER24 paramedics arrived on the scene, they found extremely damaged vehicles on both sides of the road."

"In addition to the fatalities, three other people sustained injuries."

Four men died when two bakkies collided on the N11 outside Ladysmith, in northern KwaZulu-Natal.

"Paramedics from KZN emergency medical services and a private ambulance service have treated three other patients on the scene. One of the patients is critically injured," said provincial emergency services spokesperson Robert Mckenzie.

The injured were taken to hospital in Ladysmith. Another man died and two others were injured when their vehicle rolled in Waterfall, KwaZulu-Natal.

"It is believed the driver lost control of the vehicle. It rolled several times and all three occupants were ejected from the vehicle," said ER24's Chitra Bodasing.

One of the passengers was declared dead on the scene, another sustained critical injuries and the driver sustained moderate injuries.

"Paramedics treated and transported the patients to hospital," said Bodasing.

In Pietermaritzburg a man died when he was thrown from his vehicle on Ottos Bluff Road.

"ER24 paramedics attended to the scene and on arrival found a vehicle about five metres off the road and on its side," said Bodasing.

"Paramedics could see where the driver of the vehicle drove through a fence. The man was ejected from the vehicle. Paramedics found him lying close to the roof of the vehicle."

Paramedics were notified after a farmer came across the accident while driving through the area.

Earlier in Soweto four men were found dead inside a car in what appeared to have been an accident in Snake Park in Dobsonville.

Warrant Officer Kay Makhubela said the four were found trapped inside a car on Sunday.

"It appears the car hit rocks before it crashed into a tree," he said.

"They were declared dead at the scene. It is not clear what caused the car to hit a tree, we have opened a culpable homicide case."

Another man died in a head-on collision on Witkoppen Road in Bloubosrand, Johannesburg, ER24 paramedics said.

Spokesperson Werner Vermaak said the man was found trapped in his Jeep on Sunday.

Fire-fighters used hydraulic equipment to free him from the wreckage.

"Sadly he sustained fatal injuries and there was nothing that paramedics could do for him," Vermaak said.

The driver of the other vehicle, a Toyota Corolla, sustained moderate injuries.

Ten people were killed on the N1 between Leeu Gamka and Beaufort West in the Western Cape on Sunday.

"Two people were killed in a light delivery vehicle, while another eight people were killed in a minibus taxi during the collision," said Transport MEC Donald Grant.

He said eight other people sustained minor to serious injuries.

"The cause of the crash is not yet known, but early indications suggest that fatigue may have played a role in this horrific crash."

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