Finnish police probe high-speed crash into house as driver faces traffic safety charges
Police in Finland’s Lapland region are investigating a high-speed crash in Simo after a car struck a house on Monday morning, authorities said.
The accident occurred around 9:30 a.m. when a driver, traveling at an estimated 100 kilometers per hour, veered across a residential yard and collided with the exterior wall of a single-family home in the town’s center, according to Esa Kurtti, the on-duty fire chief for Lapland’s emergency services. Rescue crews extracted the driver, who was the sole occupant of the vehicle, and transported them to a hospital for treatment. No other injuries were reported.
Tiina Majava, the lead investigator and a detective chief inspector with Lapland Police, said the preliminary inquiry is in its early stages, and the cause of the crash remains undetermined. Authorities have not disclosed the driver’s condition, citing medical privacy laws. While police do not currently suspect alcohol or drug impairment, Majava said toxicology results will be confirmed as the investigation progresses.
The driver faces suspicion of aggravated endangerment of traffic safety, Majava added. Investigators are reconstructing the sequence of events and examining potential contributing factors.
In a separate incident, Irish police are probing a fatal wrong-way collision on the M9 motorway in County Kildare. A black BMW, believed to have been stolen, traveled southbound in the northbound lanes before striking a Hyundai carrying four people—three sisters from Carlow and one of their seven-year-old children—who were en route to Dublin Airport for a family wedding in Britain. The crash killed five male teenagers inside the BMW, all of whom were masked and linked to a local crime group suspected of earlier break-in attempts in Athy, according to gardaí.
The two women in their 30s, the Hyundai’s driver and front-seat passenger, remain in critical condition at Tallaght University Hospital, while a third woman in her 20s and the child are in serious condition at St. Luke’s General Hospital and Children’s Health Ireland at Crumlin, respectively. Gardaí had deployed stinger devices near Junction 3 in Moone in an attempt to stop the BMW, but the vehicle continued on the motorway before the collision.
Meanwhile, Hungarian authorities arrested the driver of a bus carrying Polish pilgrims after a crash on the M3 highway that killed 12 people and injured nine others, two of them severely. Police in Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén County said the driver, suspected of falling asleep at the wheel, is in custody pending a court decision on pretrial detention. The injured are receiving treatment in Miskolc, with Polish officials coordinating medical support, including potential airlifts for the most severe cases.
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