A man wielding a knife hijacked a bus near Årdal in western Norway and killed three people on board, including the driver, police said Monday.

The suspect, a man of foreign descent in his 50s, was arrested and taken to a local hospital with stab wounds, state broadcaster NRK reported.

The Valdres Express bus was hijacked shortly before 6 p.m. local time between Årdal and Tyin.

Local fire officials first responded to the incident, thinking it was an accident, before police were called in, police spokesman Odd Arve Solvag told The Associated Press.

No motive has yet been released.

Police in Oslo were preparing to send an anti-terror unit to the scene but called off the deployment after the suspect was arrested, police told Norway's TV2 news channel.

It was the second deadly hijacking of a Valdres Express bus in the Scandinavian country.

In 2003, bus driver Audun Bøland, 39, and a passenger were killed when a 26-year-old man hijacked a Valdres Express bus in Fagernes.