Five hospitalised in three-vehicle pile-up on Gold Coast

A pile-up involving three vehicles – including a bus and stolen car – on the Gold Coast late Friday night has left five people in hospital, including all four passengers of the stolen vehicle and the driver in the other car.

Gold Coast police superintendent Peter Miles said seven ambulances, and police and fire crews had attended the scene at Palm Beach on the Gold Coast Highway, following reports of a 15-year-old driving a stolen black Kia vehicle, and the late-night crash.

“That vehicle was being driven by a 15-year-old – a local juvenile well-known to police,” Miles said.

The Gold Coast Highway at Fifth Avenue, where a three-car collision involving a stolen vehicle and a bus took place late Friday night. Credit: Google Maps

“He has driven that vehicle at speed into the rear of another car, and that car has been catapulted into the rear of a Surfside bus which was travelling southbound at Palm Beach, near Fifth Avenue.”

Miles said the occupants of the stolen vehicle included four teenagers, the 15-year-old male driver, a 16-year-old boy, and two teenage girls, both aged 14.

Paramedics on-scene reported examining six patients, including four teenagers – two boys in their mid-teens, a girl in her mid-teens, and a girl in her early teens – and two adult men, one in his 70s and another in his 20s.

A Queensland Ambulance Service spokeswoman said the teenagers were all taken to Gold Coast University Hospital in stable condition, and all had been “alert and oriented on [paramedics’] arrival”.

The two male teens suffered serious injuries, with one receiving significant head and the other suffering a significant head injury.

Miles said while he couldn’t confirm the exact circumstances of the crash, “the injuries for the front passenger would suggest that maybe he wasn’t wearing a seatbelt.”

Of the two 14-year-old girls in the vehicle, one received facial and arm injuries, while the other suffered abdominal and back injuries.

A QAS spokeswoman added the driver of the second car – which was launched into the back of the bus – had been examined on-scene but not transported by an ambulance for further treatment.

Police later reported the man had received care at a hospital, having received “minor injuries”.

Four people, understood by on-scene responders to be uninjured occupants on the bus, left before crews arrived.

Miles said that “thankfully” no occupants in the bus – including the driver and passengers – had been injured and no one involved in the crash had been killed.

“Thankfully there were no injuries to the persons on the bus or the bus driver … and thankfully no one was killed” Miles said.

“It could have been so much worse this, this particular incident – we could be looking at five deaths.”

Police said the southbound lane of the Gold Coast Highway was shut for a number of hours, but had since reopened, although investigations remain under way.

The 15-year-old was arrested at the scene, and remains in custody while being treated at Gold Coast University Hospital.