OVER 8,000 drivers have lost their licence for various periods of time since the point system was introduced, police said yesterday.

At present, 3,313 drivers have over 10 penalty points while 8,381 have so far lost their licence for various periods of time.

“Most are under 25-years-old and this is worrying,” traffic police chief Demetris Demetriou said.

A licence is taken away when the driver reaches 12 points.

Demetriou said most penalty points had been imposed for speeding.

Points are deleted three years after the day they were imposed.

The news came after three more young people lost their lives in separate road accidents within 15 hours over the weekend.

At around 3pm on Sunday, a high-powered motorbike being ridden by 30-year-old Limassolian Linos Charalambous collided with the side of a pick-up truck in Ayia Sofia Street in Limassol. Charalambous, who was not wearing a helmet, was thrown some distance after the impact, while his bike burst into flames.

He was taken to Limassol General Hospital, where he was declared dead on arrival. The 63-year-old driver of the pick-up truck, also from Limassol, was taken to the same hospital suffering from severe shock, but was not found to have been injured.

Limassol Traffic Police are investigating the possibility that Charalambous was driving too fast to avoid the collision.

Some 11 hours earlier, at around 3.40am, a 20-year-old Latvian woman died on the Ayia Napa-Dhekelia highway near the Ormidia flyover, after being thrown from the back of a road-racing motorbike being ridden by a 25-year-old Latvian man.

In circumstances still being investigated by police, the bike’s rider appears to have lost control and hit the central traffic barrier. Police officers who arrived first on the scene said the woman was already dead. The bike’s rider was said to have suffered light injuries to his arms, and was taken to Larnaca Hospital for treatment.

Two helmets were found at the scene of the accident, but Dhekelia deputy police chief Andreas Pitsillides told reporters that “investigators are examining whether the rider and his passenger were wearing them”.

The earliest of the weekend’s road deaths occurred around 11.50pm on Saturday night. A car being driven by Angelos Nicoloau, 22, from Nicosia, veered off Griva Digenis Avenue in Engomi (Nicosia) onto some banking, and hit a tree – cutting it in two – before coming to a halt.

Nicoloau, who was wearing a seat-belt, was taken to Nicosia General Hospital, where he was declared dead.

Nicosia Traffic Police are investigating the possibility that Nicoloau suffered heart failure.

Over the weekend, police also clocked up a record speeder, a 36-year-old in Limassol driving at 209 kilometres per hour on the Limassol-Nicosia highway. Another driver, a 50-year-old was caught driving 177kph on the stretch of highway between Larnaca and Kofinou. A third man, a 40-year-old was named driving at 160 on the Nicosia-Limassol highway. All three were arrested and face court.