An oil tanker overturned and caught fireplace in Afghanistan’s high-altitude Salang move, killing 12 individuals and injuring dozens, officers stated on Sunday.

The incident occurred late on Saturday within the province of Parwan, north of Kabul, leaving travellers on either side of the mountainous move stranded.

At the least 12 individuals had been killed and 37 others had been injured within the incident, stated Hamidullah Misbah, spokesman for the Ministry of Public Works, including the toll was anticipated to rise.

“An oil tanker overturned and caught fireplace within the Salang tunnel, which then set a number of different autos on fireplace,” Misbah informed AFP.

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Abdullah Afghan Mal, a senior well being official in Parwan, stated most of the useless included ladies and kids who had been badly burned.

“Among the many useless it was very onerous to establish who was a male and who was a feminine,” he stated.

The move was now closed for site visitors as rescue groups in helicopters deployed on the website, officers stated.

The Salang move, one of many highest mountain highways on the earth at round 3,650 metres (12,000 ft) was constructed by Soviet-era specialists within the 50s and features a 2.6-kilometre tunnel.

The move runs by way of the Hindu Kush mountain vary that connects capital Kabul to the north.

Hailed as an engineering feat upon completion, the Salang move is commonly shut for days due to accidents, heavy snowfalls and avalanches through the winter.

In 2010, avalanches killed greater than 150 individuals within the Salang move.