Eighteen pupils were sent to hospitals in Hong Kong for check-ups after a school bus struck a car on Thursday morning along a highway connecting the city and mainland China.

The accident took place at 7.43am along the Kong Sham Western Highway near Fu Tai Estate in Tuen Mun. The bus collided with the car as it drove in direction of Tuen Mun.

According to police, all 19 pupils on the bus showed no obvious signs of bruises, while a custodian in her 50s had complained of neck pain.

The school bus nanny and eighteen pupils were sent to Tuen Mun Hospital and Pok Oi Hospital for medical check-ups, with six of the students and the custodian arriving there as of 10am.

Official figures show the city has almost 21,000 cross-border students, including 900 enrolled in kindergartens, 13,000 at primary schools and another 7,000 at secondary schools.

Most of the city’s cross-border pupils are from Shenzhen, in neighbouring Guangdong province, and largely attend schools in Hong Kong’s North district, Tai Po and Yuen Long.

During the coronavirus pandemic, only a quarter of such students remained in the city, with the rest attending classes remotely from the mainland.