Sixteen people were killed and one was injured in a collision between a truck and a bus on Thursday morning in Rizhao City in east China's Shandong Province, local traffic police authorities said.

The injured had been hospitalized but are now out of danger, according to local government sources.

The accident took place on the expressway linking Rizhao and Dongming County at 6:30 AM when the truck ran into a minibus with 17 people onboard, said a traffic policeman.

He did not give much detail about the accident, except a witness's comment that the truck was driving very fast when it hit the minibus. An investigation is underway.

At about 10:55 AM on Wednesday, a car-train collision in the Beijing suburb of Shunyi also killed the car driver, though no one on the train was injured, Star Daily, a Beijing-based newspaper, reported. 

A passenger train going from Dandong in Liaoning Province to Beijing was approaching a road crossing and guards had stopped all vehicles and pedestrians, but one driver suddenly forced his way onto the railway, ignoring their warnings.

The train crashed into the car and the driver, identified later as Lu Yantao, was killed instantly. No passengers were in the car.

(China.org.cn, Xinhua News Agency November 5, 2004)