A pile-up involving more than 40 vehicles has left dozens of people injured in Hungary.

Police said the collision, which involved five tractor-trailers and 37 other vehicles, occurred on the M1 highway around 15 miles west of the capital, Budapest.

The pile-up caused 19 vehicles to catch fire and resulted in 36 injuries, including one that was life-threatening and 13 that were serious, police said.

Hungary’s National Directorate for Disaster Protection said vehicle fires had been extinguished and four rescue helicopters as well as fire and rescue teams from numerous nearby cities had arrived at the scene to treat the injured.

Authorities blocked traffic in both directions of the M1 as recovery and clean-up operations continued into the evening.

National ambulance service spokesperson Pal Gyorfi declined to give a potential cause of the accident, according to Hungarian TV station M1.

The operator of Hungary’s highways, the Hungarian Concession Infrastructure Development, wrote in a Facebook post that a localised dust storm may have caused a sudden reduction in visibility.