Two children have been killed after a truck hit an Amish horse-drawn buggy in Michigan.

The two children were among seven people thrown from the carriage after it was hit from behind in Algansee Township, a small farming community near Michigan’s borders with Indiana and Ohio.

The children, two and six, died at the scene.

Two other children, aged three and four, were taken to hospital with life-threatening injuries.

A woman from the carriage was also seriously injured.

ABC News reported that the truck driver was drunk at the time and is being held in Branch County Jail.

He has not been publicly named.

There are between 10,000 and 15,000 Amish people living in Michigan, the sixth-highest Amish population behind Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin and New York.

Amish people accept basic Christian beliefs but have special interpretations on some aspects.

Many Amish – there are a number of different groups – are suspicious of modern technologies because they fear being closer to the outside world and having their values corrupted.

The Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, says that one reason they shun the use of cars is to keep their sense of community.

An article on the centre’s website says: “By bringing greater mobility, cars would pull the community apart, eroding local ties.

“Horse and buggy transportation keeps the community anchored in its local geographical base.”

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