3 killed, several injured in central Japan expressway pileup

TSU. KAZINFORM - Three people were killed and several others injured after a five-vehicle, multi-lane accident on a central Japan expressway in the early hours of Monday, police said, Kyodo reports.

Of the eight people who were taken to hospital, Shinji Kakuta, 53, who was traveling in a midsize truck, Hiroaki Tsuzuki, 86, and his wife Mihoko, 83, both of whom were in a passenger vehicle, died in the accident on the Higashi-Meihan Expressway in Kameyama, Mie Prefecture.

Police said four others were injured and a woman in her 20s, who was driving a minivan, was unconscious and in critical condition.

At around 2:30 a.m., the minivan and midsize truck collided before a larger truck hit them and spilled its load of plastic bottles onto the road, police said. In the lane heading the other direction, two passenger cars crashed, including one in which the killed couple were traveling.

A guardrail separating the lanes was badly damaged, while workers could later be seen cleaning up plastic bottles scattered across the road.